Gallery by Tina Laney
White Sulphur Springs – The chants of “We’re No. 1” rang from the behind Mingo Central’s bench Saturday evening at The Greenbrier, summing up the evening perfectly.
In the third matchup this season of the top two ranked teams in Class AA, No. 2 Mingo Central took the rubber match with No. 1 Wyoming East, earning A 45-39 victory at Colonial Hall and with it the Battle for the Springhouse championship.
The win gives Mingo Central a 2-1 advantage in the regular season series and in all likelihood, the inside track to the No. 1 seed in the state tournament should the Miners win their section and region.
Much like the previous matchup – a 37-36 Mingo Central win at the buzzer – Saturday’s affair was another of the low-scoring variety and one that worked against the top-ranked Lady Warriors.
Their first offensive possession, a stale one that ate up two minutes of clock before resulting in a Maddie Clark jumper, was an omen of what was to come with points difficult to come by on a night where opportunities were plentiful.
East won the turnover battle 8-2 and took nine more shots (28-19) than Mingo Central in the opening half but converted on just five of them (18 percent) while Mingo nailed 10 of its attempts (53 percent).
The struggles came in part because of Mingo’s 6-foot-3 forward Jenna Sparks who erased the corner in Mingo’s 3-2 defensive deployment.
“We know them pretty well,” Mingo Central coach Kim Davis-Smith said. “Our 3-2 was effective the last time we played them and it has been our strong suit all season. We felt like that still was our best option and Jenna in the paint presents problems for people for sure and once a few shots don’t fall, even driving to the rim and getting those easier shots to fall becomes more difficult when you have 6-foot-3 inside.”
Despite the early struggles the game was tied at 5-5 after Addie Smith and Kayley Bane traded treys but Bane’s shot at the 5:32 mark proved to be the last of the quarter for East.
Four different Miners scored in a quarter-closing 8-0 run that gave Mingo a 13-5 advantage.
East made a charge when Clark hit on a layup and Colleen Lookabill nailed a 3 in the second but deuces from Dalaney Grimmett and Jenna Sparks kept East at arms length and down 23-14 at the break.
“It was one of those nights where we didn’t hit and we were very timid,” East head coach Angie Boninsegna said. “We didn’t go aggressive to the boards as a whole and we need to attack and dish and we didn’t do a good job of it tonight.”
Out of the break East found life, opening on an 8-0 run that was powered by a Clark layup and a pair of 3s from Cadee Blackburn. The offensive momentum died there as Blackburn went without a shot attempt for the rest of the quarter and a pair of layups off well-executed sets for Alyssa Davis and Bella Hall helped Mingo take a 29-22 advantage into the final quarter.
Down nine early in the final frame, East mounted one more charge when Lookabill scored on a layup and Blackburn nailed a pair of 3s that cut the deficit to three at 33-30.
“Wyoming East, they are relentless and they have that state championship mentality,” Davis-Smith said. “That’s – we’re building that in our school and program and sometimes when you’re building in the game it’s hard for the kids to have confidence when things don’t go their way and we’re finding that more and more each game. Even last night’s game was the same. We’re having more confidence when things don’t go our way. We talk about it being four quarters and we’re going to have mountains and valleys. We’re going to have to sustain what we do and our offense was spot on with some of the sets we used and we scored a lot out of that which we haven’t done all season.”
Addie Smith had the final say in the game, hitting a pair of 3s that gave her team a 39-32 advantage, one that was never truly threatened the rest of the way.
For the game East finished with a pedestrian 28 percent field goal percentage on 50 shot attempts while Mingo hit at a 49 percent rate (17 of 35).
“They played a good offensive game and defensively we didn’t play the way we can,” Boninsegna said. “Defensively we have to regroup and get back on the court on Monday. We just didn’t do anything right offensively. We had the shots, we just didn’t do it.”
Smith led all scorers with 17 while Grimmett added 10. Blackburn led East with 13 points followed by Clark with 10.
Mingo moves to 18-1 and will play Gilmer County at West Virginia State while Wyoming East drops to 14-3 and will host Belfry, Ky. on Wednesday.
Email: tylerjackson@lootpres.com and follow on Twitter @tjack94
MC: 13 10 6 16 – 45
WE: 5 9 8 17 – 39
Mingo Central
Alyssa Davis 4, Dalaney Grimmett 10, Madisyn Curry 4, Addie Smith 17, Jenna Sparks 6, Bella Hall 4
Wyoming East
Colleen Lookabill 5, Maddie Clark 10, Kayley Bane 6, Cadee Blackburn 13, Alivia Monroe 5
3-point goals – MC: 3 (Smith 3); WE: 7 (Lookabill 1, Bane 2, Blackburn 4)