| QND girls roll over Silex |
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Published: 2/26/2008 | Updated: 1/23/2009
By JOSH HOUCHINS
Herald-Whig Sports Writer
Going into the holiday break undefeated was not the first thing on Quincy Notre Dame girls basketball coach Eric Orne's mind Saturday night.
He still wants his team to get better.
"We have a tough second half of the season coming up, and we have to take games one at a time," Orne said after the Lady Raiders' 64-28 shellacking of Silex to cap the seven-game Rumble on the River High School Shootout at John Wood Community College's Student Activity Center.
"We want to come out and finish strong. We need to turn things up in practice."
It appears practice has already made perfect, as the Lady Raiders enter Christmas break with a 10-0 record and are not scheduled to play again until Jan. 3 when they travel to Pittsfield.
"It feels great going in 10-0," QND senior Renita Bunte said. "It feels even better just going in with a win."
It didn't take long for QND to establish its dominance over the Lady Owls (6-2), who entered the night ranked third in Class 1.
After Silex's Jenny Mudd capped a six-point swing to pull within 12-11 at the 3-minute mark of the first quarter, the Lady Raiders went on a 14-0 run to finish the quarter with a 26-11 lead.
"You could see our confidence growing at that point," Orne said. "The girls were talking a lot tonight and that established our defense early which made our offense better."
A Morgan Grawe jumper with just under four minutes to go in the second pushed the QND advantage to 34-13. A 9-0 run to finish the half helped push the Lady Raiders' lead to 46-20.
QND forced 24 turnovers in the first half. That's more than the amount of points Silex scored during that time span.
"We were playing great team defense and we came out hard in the first half," Bunte said. "When our defense works hard, it makes our offense really flow."
The Lady Raiders' defense held Silex's all-state performer Ashley Fleming to a mere six points — well below her season average of 23.6 points.
"We knew we had to make her go right and also just try and get her off her game," QND's Chloe Barnes said. "She got frustrated at times and I think that really gave us an advantage."
Fleming picked up her third foul 45 seconds into the second quarter and played sparingly the rest of the half.
A layup by Barnes shortly after the break pushed the QND lead to 52-21, as the Lady Raiders outscored Silex 14-4 in the third quarter.
"The one thing I really liked was our transition game," Orne said, whose team forced 32 turnovers. "We felt comfortable in our game plan tonight and I feel we executed it really well."
Barnes led the charge with a game-high 18 points, followed by teammate Karlee Gengenbacher's 16.
The Lady Raiders shot an impressive 49 percent (30 for 61) from the field, while holding the Lady Owls to a dismal 35 percent. Silex attempted a mere 31 shots.
—sports@whig.com/221-3365
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