Lady Blackhawks lose see-saw Spirit Game at charity stripe

For Cheney High School interim head coach Roxie Smith, last Saturday’s Golden Feather Spirit Game hook up with West Plains rival Medical Lake felt more like a seesaw volleyball match than basketball.

The Lady Blackhawks and Lady Cardinals battled back and forth in front of screaming fans at Eastern Washington University’s Reese Court, with momentum flowing like waves on a beach. Medical Lake took a 34-27 lead with them into the halftime locker room, but came out cold in the third quarter.

Cheney outscored the hosts 14-3 to go up 41-37 heading into the fourth. But in those final eight minutes, the tide flowed back to the Cardinals, who scored 16 of their 27 points from the free throw line, including the last five points to preserve a 64-58 win.

“Some of those were unnecessary fouls away from the basket,” Smith said of the charity opportunities.

Maggie Smith’s 17 points led Cheney in scoring, with Haley Pemberton adding 12 points and Emma Evans 11. Shelby Draper hauled in 13 rebounds to go with her six points.

It was Cheney’s second loss in as many games last week. On Jan. 8, the Lady Blackhawks found offense tough to come by on the road at unbeaten Clarkston, especially in the second and third quarters where they were outscored 23-14 in a 51-41 Great Northern League loss to the first-place Bantams.

Still, it was a much better performance than Cheney’s 23-point loss on Dec.7 to the state’s sixth-ranked 2A team, according to the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association’s Jan. 15 Ratings Percentage Index (RPI). Coach Smith felt her team played well the second time around against Clarkston, and attributed the setback to a case of too many turnovers.

“If we can fix that, we can compete,” she added.

Evans was the only Cheney player in double-digit scoring with 12 points.

Cheney sits in fourth place in the GNL at 1-4, 5-8 overall. The Lady Blackhawks will get a heavy dose of league play this week in wrapping up round two, traveling to third-place West Valley (2-3, 8-5) on Tuesday and top-ranked and second-place East Valley (5-1, 13-1) Friday before returning home to face fifth-place Pullman (0-6, 4-10) on Saturday, Jan. 19.

Smith feels her team is making progress, and has the chance to come up with a couple of victories if they play well this week.

“I feel like we are getting better every time we play,” she said.

John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com.