WEST SUNBURY, Pa. (EYT/D9) — Wave after wave of players came off the bench for the Redbank Valley girls basketball team.
The tsunami of threats was too much for Moniteau to deal with.
The Bulldogs built a 10-point lead in the second half, largely thanks to their balance and depth, and withstood a few Warrior runs to come away with a 58-49 win at Moniteau High School Tuesday night.
Redbank had six players score five or more points and went nine deep. Moniteau played just six players.
Redbank Valley, Keystone, and Union/A-C Valley sports coverage on Explore and D9Sports.com is brought to you by Heeter Lumber.
“Our bench over the past couple of years has been a strength of ours,” said Redbank Valley coach Chris Edmonds. “We try to get everyone involved in the game.”
Moniteau did the best it could shorthanded. Kendall Sankey, cleared to play again after recovering from a torn ACL before the season, was the only reserve and scored eight off the bench for the Warriors.
They weren’t enough to counter Redbank Valley’s wealth of reserves.
“They’re deep and we’re not,” said Moniteau coach Dee Arblaster. “We’re missing one of our subs because of sickness, so that didn’t help having only six girls.
“It was good to get Kendall back,” Arblaster added. “She’ll get better. She’ll get more confident and be a big player for us.”
Redbank Valley had several players come up big.
Alivia Huffman scored 14 points and freshman Mylee Harmon came off the bench to score 11 — 10 coming in the first half. Se hit two big 3-pointers to help the Bulldogs take the lead for good in the second quarter.
Madison Foringer also reached double digits for Redbank with 10 points and Claire Clouse added eight.
Redbank Valley’s bench scored 24 points.
Harmon made a big impact in other ways, too. She played good defense and also handled the ball well at the point when giving Huffman and breather.
The young guard has been playing with poise that belies her youth.
“Mylee has done an excellent job for us this year,” Edmonds said. “She takes a lot of pride in her ball handling. She’s starting to see the court better — she’s a freshman playing against upperclassmen. She’s finding her role on the team, which is good.”
Moniteau started the game hot, taking as 13-8 lead at one point and a 15-11 advantage after the first eight minutes.
Abbey Jewart scored eight of her 11 points for the Warriors in the first quarter to help Moniteau get out to that start.
But Redbank Valley sliced away at that lead in the second. Harmon’s second 3-pointer of the frame gave the Bulldogs a 19-18 lead and they never trailed again.
Redbank pushed the lead to 10 early in the third quarter, but Moniteau was able to stay in the game and keep the Bulldogs from running away and hiding. The Warriors, though, could never get closer than three.
“We had to keep it close,” Arblaster said. “We can’t go against a team like that down 10 all the time. We kept battling back and I was happy with that. I thought our effort was good, but they can just keep rotating people in. They have some good ballplayers.”
So does Moniteau.
Sophomore guard Catherine Kelly scored a game-high 22 points. She was one of the main reasons why Moniteau was able to stay within striking distance in the second half by hitting four 3-pointers in the final two quarters.
Edmonds wasn’t surprised. He expected a dogfight.
“Dee has them ready to play every time we play them. It’s always a battle. Moniteau is tough place to play. We sort of lost our focus there for awhile and didn’t do what we wanted to do. That kept it close.”
Both teams are happy with the direction they are going.
“We break the season into quarters and we’re going into second quarter,” Edmonds said. “This is where we wanted to be. We have the KSAC schedule coming up, so we’re happy with our win-loss record, but there’s a lot of work to do.”
Arblaster is also pleased with how her team is trending in a big week for the Warriors. Moniteau plays rival Karns City on Thursday.
“We’re getting there,” Arblaster said. “Having a small bench doesn’t help and we don’t have much experience, but getting Kendall back helps. What’s going to make us successful is we’re going to have to have five people score.”
Redbank Valley, Keystone, and Union/A-C Valley sports coverage on Explore and D9Sports.com is brought to you by Heeter Lumber.
