Rebels girls basketball team keeps undefeated streak alive

By Greg Price
Taber Times
gprice@tabertimes.com

W.R. Myers Rebels varsity girls basketball team kept its undefeated streak alive with another tournament win over the weekend at Brooks Composite.

It was a battle of unbeatens in the tournament final as both the Rebels and Eagle Butte had flawless records up to that point for the championship final on the season.

The battle of unbeatens resulted in a 72-51 championship victory as the Rebels pushed its record to 11-0.

“We had this game circled a long time ago. When we saw that Eagle Butte was in this tournament and on the other side of the draw, we thought we would probably meet them in the final. With Eagle Butte being a strong 3A girls team in the south, we really wanted to play well,” said Kenney Wood, head coach of the W.R. Myers Rebels varsity girls basketball team. “They had not lost a game up to that point and neither had we, so someone was coming out of that game losing their undefeated record. I was expecting this game to be much tighter than it was. We pushed a 10-point lead right away and kept that most of the game. We had to play like it was much closer. Defensively, we had to play extremely hard and offensively we had to continue to score.”

The Rebels raced out of the gate to a 22-10 lead in the first quarter, putting Eagle Butte in an unfamiliar place they had not seen all year, playing while behind.

“They put together a few runs to try and catch up, and they closed the gap to under 10 a couple times, but we stayed composed and pushed our lead back up to double digits. All weekend long we played great defensively,” said Wood. “Some of the girls don’t get a lot of credit on the stat sheet, but they are playing just as hard as everyone else. Tiffany Olsen, Taylor Moser and Chelsea Hubble always give the team 100 per cent effort. It’s players like them that allow us to continue to do well, they just go in and do their job, they are great team players.”

Tournament MVP Katessa Gross poured in 18 points for the Rebels. Player of the Game Natalie Hoyt hit for 15 points. Hayley Lepard and Paige Wood both chipped in 12 points while hauling in eight rebounds. Millay Johnson had 11 points and five steals.

Rebels started its tournament run with an 83-25 trouncing of Queen Elizabeth.

Lepard poured in 29 points to go with seven rebounds. Sadie Lund had the double double with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Johnson, Gross and Hoyt all added 11 points. Hubble grabbed 11 rebounds. Player of the Game was Sadie Lund.

“We started the game quite slow being up 17-10 in the first quarter. You could tell we hadn’t played in a while, but second quarter we picked it up and scored 23 points and held them to three.”

There was plenty of points to be had for the Rebels off of turnovers in the tournament semifinal with W.R. Myers emerging victorious 82-29 over Calgary Christian. The game was tight until the third quarter when the Rebels outscored Calgary Christian 26-8 in the quarter.

Johnson had 21 points to go with nine steals. Hoyt hit for 22 points and had eight steals. The ball thefts continued with Gross grabbing seven steals. Lund had 10 points to go with six rebounds. Johnson was Player of the Game.

The Rebels head into mid-January with an 11-0 record. The team’s league game against the Magrath Pandas was canceled last Wednesday due to weather and has been rescheduled for Jan. 28.

The Rebels are on the road today against the Medicine Hat Kwahommies.

“It should be a tough game. This year our league games are all going to be a challenge. If a team doesn’t bring their ‘A’ game they are going to lose,” said Wood.“So here we sit at 11-0, but we still have lots to work on. We are seeing improvement in every game.”