GALION — Highland (6-10, 4-7 Mid Ohio Athletic Conference) completed a season sweep of Galion on Tuesday evening by a score of 50-40. This win comes as Highland’s fifth victory in its last six games.
“It gives our kids a ton of confidence,” Highland head coach Matt Bradley said. “Ton of credit to Galion. I know their record isn’t very good, but they continue to get better and better. Coach (Shani) Rush does a really good job.”
The Scots were led by Emma West who poured in 17 points. Next up was Guinevere Jackson scoring 11 points. Brylinn Tuggle added eight points for Highland.
Despite the loss, Galion was paced by Cameron Eckert who scored 11 points. Teanna Greter added 11 points and Natalee Perkins put in 10 points.
Galion (4-12, 0-9 MOAC) hosted their seniors for senior night and recognized seven seniors. Natalee Perkins, Teanna Greter, Kylie McKee, Emma Jutz, Alisha Cocklin, Dakota Barnes and Phynix Cole all had their names called.
Highland stormed out of this one quickly. The Scots took a quick 10-2 lead and led Galion 18-9 after a quarter of play. Highland made four three-pointers in the first quarter and six in the first half.
“I thought we did a nice job tonight. The first quarter a couple of our shots weren’t falling. Cameron did a nice job of hitting some shots and keeping us in the game,” Rush said.
Galion clawed their way back and trailed just 32-25 at intermission. Eckert was a big part in the good first half play for the Tigers. The freshmen had 11 first half points, including three triples. Eckert did not hesitate to pull the trigger.
“We just throw her (Eckert) into the fire and she gets a lot of experience. Not a lot of freshmen get that opportunity and she embraces it,” Rush said.
West led the Scots with nine first half points, five of those came from the charity strike.
Coming out of the half, the third quarter was a low scoring affair. Each team scored seven points. Highland went into the final eight minutes leading 39-32. Scots’ Jackson knocked down her third triple of the game in the third quarter.
Highland was able to hold onto this one with a strong defensive fourth quarter. The second half saw Highland out score Galion 18-15.
“They (Galion) did a really good job of grinding the tempo down to a halt. We told our girls that winning a varsity game in any sport is really hard. We will take them any way we can get them,” said Bradley.
Highland won the turnover battle by turning the ball over just 11 times. Galion gave the ball up 15 times.
