Rangely girls bring home two more victories, secure home playoff

RANGELY | The Rangely High School girls’ basketball team brought home two more victories last weekend, winning 70-10 against Caprock on Friday and 54-35 against West Grand on Saturday.
In the game against Caprock Katye Allred led the scoring with 15 points, Lindzey Thacker had 14 and Katelyn Brown had 12. Kassidee Brown added nine points, Skylar Thacker had eight, McKenzie Webber had seven and Halie Elam had five. While seniors Antoinette Dorris and Sidney Shaffer didn’t get in on the scoring, their defense significantly helped in the victory.
Katelyn Brown led in assists with 10.
Rangely JV also defeated Caprock 57-2.
Saturday’s game against West Grand was closer in score.
“This was a hard-fought battle,” said girls’ head coach Quinton Kent. “West Grand is a good team and we struggled to get anything going against them in the first half. It was a very physical first half and we seemed a bit out of sorts, which resulted in us being down six at the half. We made some defensive changes at halftime to slow down their inside game and force them to shoot from the outside. We also made some adjustments on the offensive end to get some better looks at the basket and the shots started falling. Our shots fell, which energized our defense and they had to rely on outside shooting for any scoring. As a result, we outscored them 16-2 in the third and 19-8 in the fourth.”
At halftime, coaches challenged their players to get rebounds on both ends of the floor and they responded extremely well in the second half.
“We only had six total rebounds at halftime and finished the game with 33. That was huge,” Kent said.
Lindzey Thacker had five offensive rebounds, Katye Allred and Sidney Shaffer each had three offensive boards. On the defensive end, Thacker had eight rebounds and Allred had five. Allred also led the interior defense with a couple blocks in the second half and her presence alone altered shots and forced West Grand to rely on outside shooting, which worked in the Panthers’ favor.
Katelyn Brown led on the offensive end with 27 points, including five 3-point shots and a perfect 10 for 10 from the free-throw line. Lindzey Thacker was the only other player in double figures with 11, but Kassidee Brown contributed nine, Sidney Shaffer five and Katye Allred two in the winning effort.
“We are really pleased with the way we have passed the ball as a team in the last seven games. Our number of assists has been increasing throughout the year, which has made us hard to guard. Katelyn Brown led us with seven assists, followed by Sidney Shaffer’s five. As coaches, we are loving that they are making good passes for the most part and the ball is going in the hole,” Kent said.
The win secured a home playoff game on Wednesday, Feb. 22, probably against Vail Christian or West Grand.
The JV team lost to West Grand 38-35.