The Centralia girls kept growing their lead on Tuesday.
The Lady Panthers beat Class 3 District 7 foe North Callaway 67-12 on the road after finishing with 21 steals. Centralia had nine players …
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The Centralia girls kept growing their lead on Tuesday.
The Lady Panthers beat Class 3 District 7 foe North Callaway 67-12 on the road after finishing with 21 steals. Centralia had nine players score while North Callaway were missing two players due to injury.
Centralia head coach Megan Brinkmann said the Lady Panthers (2-0) are confident in any five players they have on the court at any given time. She said the team’s half court defense has been “a step ahead” than she expected.
“We’ve made it a standard,” Brinkmann said. “That’s what we do extremely well, and the kids buy in. They just take pride on that end of the floor.”
Brinkmann said Centralia won its season opener 50-36 at California but didn’t play as well offensively. She said defense is what carried the Lady Panthers that night, and it impressed yet again on Tuesday.
North Callaway head coach Andrew Klein said the team hasn’t been at full strength yet and were missing its leading scorer and sophomore point guard Sophie Olsson. She led the Ladybirds (0-2) in their season-opening loss to Van-Far but hurt her ankle so she has been forced to sit out. Klein said sophomores Anna Shryock and Emily Huddleston each put in time at point guard with little prior experience.
“I’m proud of our girls as they are two sophomores that haven’t been asked to bring up the ball maybe ever in their lives while playing maybe against the best team in state,” Klein said. “That’s a lot to ask so I’m proud of those girls for trying.”
Braylin Brunkhorst led Centralia with 13 points, seven rebounds and three steals, and the team’s other returning all-stater Ryenn Gordon had 12 points, five rebounds and four steals. Madi Johnson finished with 10 points and two 3-pointers, and Ealynne Bostick had eight points, four steals and two 3-pointers.
Brinkmann said Centralia is deep offensively after Bostick and Brooklyn Hardin have shown improvement as sophomores. Meanwhile, Liv Hartley had eight points in her first game back at North Callaway. Hardin matched that total with eight points along with three steals, and Madilynn Hunter added four points and seven rebounds.
“We were extremely unselfish today,” Brinkmann said. “I told them that was the best thing about tonight. We gave up good shots for great shots, we shared the basketball and it made everybody better and made the game more fun.”
Icey Tomlinson led North Callaway with four points and four rebounds. Klein said the Ladybirds were happy to have such a good test as they bring their “next man mentality” into a 7:30 p.m. Thursday home game against Eastern Missouri Conference foe Silex (0-1, 0-1 EMO).
“We had a few things we wanted to do,” Klein said. “We wanted to limit the turnovers, and I don’t think we did that very well. But we rebounded the ball pretty well on the defensive end. In the first half, we gave up five offensive rebounds. The score was ugly, but by the end of it, we started growing a little bit as a team.”
Centralia hosts Southern Boone (2-1) at 7:30 p.m. Thursday in what will be the Lady Panthers’ home opener. Brinkmann said this team has looked good through two games.
“We’re able to mix some things up,” Brinkmann said. “All around, we can all be threats and are really hard to stop when we share the basketball like we did.”
