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New Richmond – When Chad Meador met Wyoming East senior Hannah Blankenship in the pregame captain’s meeting he noticed something was different.
“I saw her when I shook her hand and I saw the determination and the focus in her eyes,” Meador said. “I knew she was going to have a game. I didn’t realize she was going to stroke it that well.”
The Summers County head coach may want to predict the lottery numbers next.
Blankenship scored a season-high 23 points on 9 of 15 shooting from the field Wednesday night as the Lady Warriors defended the Class AA Region 3, Section 1 title in a 58-45 win over the Lady Bobcats in New Richmond.
Battling a shoulder injury all season, the sharpshooting senior has struggled at times to find her shot. Wednesday she found it as her teammates found her.
“I knocked down a couple of shots early and my teammates kept feeding me the ball,” Blankenship said. “All credit to them for getting me open looks. Thankfully they were going down for me tonight. I’ve just been in physical therapy and overall taking better care of my body in that aspect. It’s definitely helped a ton because I’ve gotten more arch on my shot so it’s definitely paying off.”
Losing to East by 25 and 37 in the regular season, Summers started fast with Gracie Harvey winning the tip and getting it to Liv Meador who tossed the ball to a streaking Sullivan Pivont for a layup.
Over the next three minutes Cadee Blackburn and Maddie Clark were the metaphorical pins, popping the balloon that was Summers’ optimism.
Blankenship put East on the board with a jumper and Clark picked off back-to-back passes, turning the latter into a three-point play. Five straight from Blackburn and a 3-pointer from Clark put the hosts up 13-2 before the crowd had settled in.
Avery Lilly snapped the 13-0 run with a layup but Blankenship twisted the knife with a 3-pointer on the other end and when the first-quarter horn sounded the hosts held an 18-6 advantage.
Pivont cut the deficit back to 10 at the start of the second but another Blankenship 3 pushed the lead back to 13.
Afterwards the East offense hit a rut and Summers capitalized with a 5-0 spurt but miscues provided the Lady Warriors distance. Four Summers turnovers to close the half sparked an 11-4 run that featured seven more points from Blankenship who scored 10 in the frame.
“Hannah shot the ball really well all night especially in the first half,” East head coach Angie Boninsegna said. “We found the openings and she shot it well and that was a big boost for us. I thought our press gave them a little bit of trouble and they got tired in the first half. It’s a shame we had to come in at halftime cause we really were doing good.”
The turnovers were the story of the half for the Lady Bobcats as they went into the intermission down 34-19, having given the ball away 18 times. They finished with 29 turnovers on the evening.
“It’s a true testimony to how good (East) is,” Meador said. “Now I know those look like large stats and they are, but they’re causing those stats. I get on our players about turning the ball over but it’s hard to stop turning the ball over when you have two aggressive defenders swarming you. Hats off to them and hats off to the coaches for getting their players to play hard each and every game. I think that’s one thing about Wyoming East and their program for the last decade. They always play hard. I don’t know what’s said in their locker room but they always play hard, especially here. Very difficult place to play.”
East threatened to bust the game open at the start of the second half on the strength of a Blackburn 3 but the visitors battled back each time they were on the mat. Even after Blackburn and Blankenship went back-to-back on triples late in the third to push the lead to 21 the Lady Bobcats never relented, using a 7-0 run in the fourth to stay competitive.
It was what Meador was looking for after he wrote the score of their 49-24 December loss to East in Hinton on the team’s whiteboard in the locker room following that game.
“Pound for pound they’re a better team than we are,” Meador said. “But after we beat Bluefield the other night I asked the team to promise me they’d fight and compete. Whatever the score at the end of the basketball game we’ll deal with it and we’ll live to see another day. They did that tonight. They competed and never gave up. In fact Angie called a timeout with about 2:15 left in the fourth quarter and I told them to play their hardest. They responded to that and I see a team that’s grown offensively – not just on the court but in their mindset. So their hearts are beating a little further out of their chest. They’re gelling more. We’ll put a product on the floor next Thursday and see what happens.”
Blankenship led all scorers with 23 points while Cadee Blackburn added 18 on 6 of 10 shooting from the floor. Maddie Clark scored 11 to go along with six steals and five assists. Gracie Harvey led Summers County with 13 points while Liv Meador pitched in 10.
Wyoming East, the defending Class AA champion, will host one of the two Region 3 co-finals next Thursday, awaiting the result of Friday’s Section 2 championship between Chapmanville and Mingo Central. East will host the loser of the game while Summers County will travel to the winner.
Email: tylerjackson@lootpress.com and follow on Twitter @tjack94
— Tyler Jackson (@TJack94) February 24, 2022
SC: 6 13 14 12 – 45
WE: 18 16 18 6 – 58
Summers County
Gracie Harvey 13, Maggie Stover 3, Avery Lilly 4, Liv Meador 10, Sullivan Pivont 7, Abby Persinger 2, Jesse Ward 6
Wyoming East
Hannah Blankenship 23, Maddie Clark 11, Kayley Bane 2, Cadee Blackburn 18, Charleigh Price 2, Abby Russell 2
3-point goals – SC: 1 (Meador 1); WE: 9 (Blankenship 5, Clark 1, Blackburn 3).