By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Washburn Rural girls basketball bounced back from a loss in a big way Wednesday night, rolling to a 56-26 home Centennial League win over Topeka High.
Senior Zoe Canfield scored 17 points with three 3-pointers in Wednesday's 56-26 Washburn Rural win over Topeka High. [Photo by Doug Walker/Special to TSN]
Freshman Maddie Vickery scored 16 points and grabbed 11 rebounds in Wednesday's 56-26 Washburn Rural win over Topeka High. [Photo by Doug Walker/Special to TSN]
Coming off an eight-point road loss at Hayden last Friday, 10th-ranked (Class 6A) Rural trailed just once, at 2-0, Wednesday night and opened up a commanding 31-13 lead at the half and led 52-18 after three quarters to force a running clock throughout the fourth quarter.
"We were disappointed (Friday),'' Washburn Rural coach Kevin Bordewick said. "Not to take anything away from Hayden because they came after us and credit to them, but we didn't answer well at all and we were just not ourselves.
"We didn't feel like we were ourselves and we know we can probably play a little bit better than what we did tonight but we were excited that we were a little bit more fluid in our offense and we were a little bit more tenacious with our defense and those were things we wanted to see.''
Senior star Zoe Canfield and freshman standout Maddie Vickery combined for 33 points against the young Trojans but Rural (6-2 overall, 2-1 Centennial) also got solid play from a host of other players, with seven Junior Blues cracking the scoring column.
"I think it was a little rough shooting for us at the very start,'' Bordewick said. "We missed some wide-open looks and we're still missing some cribbies and some 15-footers and some 3s that were wide open, too. So I know we can shoot better but I think we had a contribution from a lot of different players.
"The first three subs off the bench were Hallie (Walker), Madison (Lemke) and Brook (Rutherford) and I thought they did a tremendous job giving us a little bit of a breather and keeping some kids fresh. I thought they really did a nice job defensively and offensively.''
Canfield, a Kansas signee, scored a game-high 17 points with three 3-pointers while Vickery scored 16 points and recorded a double-double with 11 rebounds.
Junior Tenly Bunck added six points on a pair of 3-pointers and senior Destiny Ochs also scored six points while junior Kate Hinck scored five points and grabbed eight rebounds.
Sophomore Keimara Marshall led Topeka High (2-6, 0-2) with 14 points while freshman Ahsieryrhuajh Rayton added eight point.
Washburn Rural is scheduled to travel to Manhattan on Friday while Topeka High is slated to be at home to face Hayden.
WASHBURN RURAL 56, TOPEKA HIGH 26
Topeka High 5 8 5 8 -- 26
Washburn Rural 10 21 21 4 -- 56
