WHEELING — Morgantown and Wheeling Park had their latest rematch Tuesday inside The Palace on the Hill, the meeting between the No. 2 Mohigans and No. 4 Patriots a run-back of last season’s state championship game, and a hard-fought match on Dec. 19, both meetings going in Morgantown’s favor.
It was Wheeling Park who came out on the winning side of Tuesday’s matchup, securing a 69-59 victory on their home floor in the latest installation of what has become an exciting rivalry between two top teams.
“We lost the state finals, we lost the first one down there, we knew we had to get some momentum back against them,” Wheeling Park head coach Ryan Young said. “They’re an excellent basketball team, this is just one game in the grand scheme of things. We know we’re going to have to play them probably two more times, hopefully three because that’d mean we’d both be down in Charleston.”
Wheeling Park was led by Lala Woods, who made seven 3-pointers on her way to a game-high 28 points, also tallying seven rebounds and two steals. Woods, a junior, scored her 1,000th point in the second quarter on a free throw attempt.
Woods, a returning all-state first-team performer, showed up big in a big game, as did fellow all-state first-team player Alexis Bordas, who scored 26 with six rebounds.
“It’s huge,” Young said of the play of his two standout juniors. “Lala first half, carried us. Alexis second half, came back after shooting poorly in the first. I was really happy with her effort– she never gets down, she stays steady and plays through things. She’s a great rebounder, she did a great job, I thought, on the Jones girl.
“I thought all our kids defensively paid attention to their assignments and really made it hard on them. Morgantown’s a good team, they still ended up with close to 60 points but we made them earn a lot of those. Lala, just icing on the cake going over 1,000 tonight. We’ve had a kid as a sophomore go over 1,000 and now one as a junior, so that just tells you they’re special players and we’re fortunate to have them.”
Sadaya Jones was the top scorer for Morgantown, putting up 20 points and seven rebounds.
Woods helped Wheeling Park jump out to a 17-7 lead to start the game, scoring nine points and grabbing three rebounds in the stretch. Wheeling Park led 22-15 after the first quarter.
Morgantown put on a full-court press to start the second quarter, but the added pressure could not slow down a hot-shooting Patriots team, who made eight 3-pointers in the first half, five from Woods, to lead 38-29 at the half.
The 3-point shot was key Tuesday, Wheeling Park going 12-30 from distance while Morgantown went 1-8. The Patriots played tough enough inside against a Mohigans interior led by Jones and Lily Jordan to keep Morgantown from dominating inside and keep the Mohigans offense from catching up.
“We got them by nine at our place, they got us by 10 up here,” Morgantown head coach Doug Goodwin said. “They shot lights out. Credit to Alexis and Lala, 28 and 26 points. They shot very well with a hand in their face, they took us away from things we were trying to do offensively. All credit to Wheeling Park tonight for the effort they gave.”
A nine-point halftime advantage never shrunk to any amount less for Park the rest of the way, the home team ahead 59-41 after three quarters.
Morgantown did give cause for pause late in the fourth, their press generating several live-ball turnovers and quick lay-ins around the basket, getting to a 10-point game, 67-57, but it was too little too late for the visitors.
“In the fourth quarter we still were letting it fly, and we needed to settle down and run some clock,” Young said. “After a couple timeouts I thought we did do that. We just have to be ready for those situations. I think we’re just so used to playing the way we play, but when we get into a fourth-quarter game against a good team we’ve just got to learn how to be patient and run some clock. I thought we rebounded the ball pretty well.”
“We got caught on screens a little more, didn’t recover as well,” Goodwin said of the differences between Tuesday and the two teams’ last meeting. “All things that we can work on and get better at. They just shot lights out, plain and simple. Toward the end there we had to foul, send them to the free throw line. We did get aggressive in our full-court press there at the end, got some buckets. It’s a learning experience for us, we’ll improve and get better and move on.”
For Park, Woods and Bordas were joined in double figures by Jillian Huffman with 10 points and seven rebounds. Natalie Daugherty led the Patriots in assists with five, also scoring three points and grabbing five rebounds and three steals. Merritt Delk secured seven rebounds and dished two assists off the bench.
For Morgantown, Jones’ 20 was followed by Jordan’s 12 points and eight rebounds, Kayli Kellogg’s nine points and nine rebounds, and Sofia Wassick’s eight points. Morgantown out-rebounded Park by a slim margin, 37-35, while each team committed 10 turnovers.
Park (12-3) next faces John Marshall on the road on Thursday. Morgantown (11-2) plays Russel (Ky.) at St. Albans on Friday.
By NICK HENTHORN
BOX SCORE
Wheeling Park 69, Morgantown 59
MORGANTOWN (59) – Wassick 4 0-0 8; Jones 8 3-5 20; Kellogg 4 1-4 9; Jordan 6 0-1 12; Smith 2 0-0 4; Hatcher 2 2-4 6; Totals 26 6-14 59.
WHEELING PARK (69) – Delk 0 0-0 0; Huffman 3 2-2 10; Daugherty 1 0-4 3; Heller 1 0-0 2; Hicks 0 0-0 0; Bordas 8 8-10 26; Woods 8 5-8 28; Totals 21 15-24 69.
Three-point goals: Morgantown 1 (Jones). Wheeling Park 12 (Woods 7, Bordas 2, Huffman 2, Daugherty).
