Mavericks shut down Warriors

EDMONDS — Meadowdale didn’t want to take any chances.

With first place in the division on the line and the Mavericks facing an up-and-coming Edmonds-Woodway team, Meadowdale wanted to get off to a strong start against its archrival.

Goal accomplished.

Less than 30 seconds into the first quarter, a swarming Maverick defense forced two Warrior turnovers. Meadowdale kept the pressure on, forcing Edmonds-Woodway to turn the ball over seven more times in the first quarter.

Meanwhile at the other end of the court, junior center Quinn Brewe scored 12 of her game-high 26 points in the first quarter, as Meadowdale took a 19-6 first quarter lead and went on to seize first place in the Western Conference 4A South Division with a decisive 64-42 victory over Edmonds-Woodway Jan. 3 at Edmonds-Woodway High School.

The Mavericks improved to 5-0 in the division and 6-0 overall, while the Warriors fell to 3-1 and 5-1.

“We knew they were going to come out really strong. It’s for first place in league,” said Brewe, who also had 12 rebounds. “So we just came and played Meadowdale defense and … made sure that they didn’t get in it from the beginning.”

Brewe has been averaging 19 points and 9.5 rebounds a game this season.

Sophomore forward Katie Trew admitted that it took Edmonds-Woodway about a quarter to figure out a way to deal with the pressure from the Meadowdale defense.

“They kind of just took us off guard at first,” Trew said. “We knew they were going to pressure but we weren’t really sure how they were going to do it … so it just took us a little bit to try and figure out what they were doing.”

Edmonds-Woodway simply couldn’t take care of the basketball early on, according to first-year Warrior coach Amy Branch.

But after turning the ball over nine times in the opening period, Edmonds-Woodway settled down in the second quarter and cut its miscues to four.

A trio of 3-pointers by Kelsey Hitchner, Rebekah Wells and Trew helped jump start the Warrior offense. Edmonds-Woodway outscored Meadowdale 14-13 in the second quarter and trailed 32-20 at halftime.

“We just had to figure out what we were doing and be more careful with the ball,” Trew said. “We just had to take care of the ball. That was a big, big thing.”

Meadowdale coach Karen Blair was pleased with her team’s strong start.

“We did a good job in the full court,” said Blair. “(We) got them off balance and I think they did a great job adjusting, taking care of the ball and had great patience on their offense, which helped them get back into it.”

The talk at halftime in the Meadowdale lockerroom was to stay low and to keep moving the feet.

Junior guard Anne Martin scored 10 of her 16 points in the third quarter, including a 3-pointer to start off the quarter. Martin has been averaging 12 points per game.

By the end of the quarter, the Mavericks expanded their 15-point halftime advantage into a 24-point lead.

“Our transition on offense was a big key,” Blair said. “Anne Martin did a great job of getting down the floor … maybe they got a little tired there (during) that stretch in the third quarter. I feel like we were able to kind of jump on them a little bit.”

Edmonds-Woodway looked to its big people for offense in the second half.

Junior forward Morgan Harter scored her team’s first four points in the third quarter, while Trew scored eight straight points to start the fourth quarter.

“I feel that Morgan and Katie are really doing well for us in the posts,” Branch said. “We wanted to use our strengths and take it to them down there and try some of that.”

Brewe was in foul trouble in the second half, which may have contributed to a letdown defensively, according to Blair.

“We talked about that after the game, trying to play a more consistent 32 minutes of basketball,” Blair added. “There were those (post defense) lapses in the second half, which we haven’t had all year. We’ll come back and work on it in practice.”

Meadowdale is on the road at Everett for a 7:30 p.m. game tonight (Friday, Jan. 10), while Edmonds-Woodway travels to Mountlake Terrace for a 7:30 p.m. contest tonight.

Branch describes her squad as one of the most highly motivated, hard-working group of individuals she’s been around and she is confident they will bounce back from the loss.

“They’re going to come in and really do some good things and hopefully that will lead to wins,” Branch said, “but we are looking at small wins where we come together as a team, we play well together, we stick together and we don’t fall apart and if that means we have more points at the end of the game, that’s what it means. But that’s not our focus right now.”

NOTES

ON THE MEND: Meadowdale’s Tara Jacob could see her first action of the season in the next couple of weeks. The senior center suffered a torn ACL during a tournament at White River last summer.

Jacob is starting to do some drills and went through warmups for the first time this season with the rest of the team, according to coach Karen Blair.

“We’re hoping in the next couple of weeks to get her testing the leg and try to get her in some kind of shape so that she can get out there and contribute to the team,” Blair said.