COLUMBIA – Unique Drake kept the points coming for Westwood all night at Spring Valley Tuesday.
The Redhawks needed only to slow down the Vikings for a quarter.
Drake finished the night with 33 points, and the Redhawks shut out the Vikings inside the 3-point line in the second quarter en route to a 79-65 victory.
Nyah Leveretter (21) drives the lane to slip through the Spring Valley defense. | Leroy Howard
“Drake is certainly unique,” Gregory Bauldrick said. “The name is very fitting. How she goes, we go. We knew that there were gonna be folks on her but we weren’t gonna back off from it.”
Nyah Leveretter scored 15 points, had 10 rebounds and blocked three shots for the Redhawks (6-0). Maliyah Lockett had 12 points.
Spring Valley (4-1) and Westwood went shot-for-shot in the first quarter. The Vikings outsized their opponent under the net and took a 19-18 lead on a pair of Lauryn Taylor foul shots with 12 seconds left.
“We knew that it was going to be uptempo,” Bauldrick said. “We weren’t getting our rotations correctly, we were moving in man, and we were uncertain who we wanted to play, who we wanted to defend.”
The Redhawks used a 2-3 zone set five feet in front of the net to push the Vikings out of position in the second quarter.
“We put them in a zone, let them rotate and communicate, let them loosen up,” Bauldrick said. “Once we did that, I thought we got going.”
While the Westwood point guard flitted through Spring Valley defenders and scored the first six points of the second quarter, Spring Valley couldn’t even approach the net. The Westwood defense trapped Vikings and forced 3-point shots to go wide or ricochet off the rim.
Only Spring Valley’s Ashley Williamson, who drained her first of seven 3-pointers on the night, made good in the second quarter.
Westwood took a 35-22 lead into the half.
That margin was all the Redhawks needed. In spite of Williamson’s six 3-pointers and 23 points overall in the second half, Spring Valley could not close the gap.
Williamson finished the night with 30 points. Taylor had 15.
Westwood – 18 – 17 – 22 – 22 – 79
Spring Valley – 19 – 3 – 19 – 24 – 65
WHS: Unique Drake 33, Nyah Leveretter 15, Maliyah Lockett 12, Belton 7, Frederick 3, Etheredge 5, Mines 2, Ray 2.
SV: Ashley Williamston 30, Lauryn Taylor 15, Wiley 8, Wall 6, Coleman 6.
