By WESLEY REMMER
Staff writer
It’s been an up-and-down year for the Bremerton girls basketball team. But after victories against Klahowya and Port Townsend, the team is riding a high.
After a tumultuous midseason stretch in which the Lady Knights (6-5 Olympic League, 7-8 overall) lost seven straight games, the team has rebounded nicely to win two of its last three, including a dominant 75-33 win against Klahowya last week and Tuesday’s 71-49 home victory over Port Townsend.
“I hope we can play like we did tonight for the rest of the season,” coach Daniel McInnis said of Tuesday’s game, adding that he was impressed with his team’s scrappy play.
“We moved the ball around and were aggressive,” he said. “That was nice to see.”
Tuesday’s game was strikingly similar to an early season match-up between BHS and PT, which the Lady Knights won 68-44.
“Yeah, it was pretty similar,” McInnis said. “This game, we started out a little faster. They had a lead early last time.”
In that game, Port Townsend held a 17-15 lead after one quarter, and it wasn’t until the second half that the Knights seized control of the game.
But this time around senior Jackie Hill, who scored a season-high 23 points, helped the Knights to get out of the gates quickly. BHS opened the second quarter with an 11-0 run and eventually took a 42-29 lead into the half, never looking back.
“The game just came to her,” McInnis said of Hill’s performance. “She got a lot of points off steals and fast breaks. She was very aggressive tonight, which is something we’ve been trying to get her to be (all year).”
Many of Hill’s points, along with other Lady Knights’ fast-break points, came off snappy outlet passes from Gina Ogazi.
Ogazi dominated the paint all night, scoring 12 points and hauling in 16 rebounds.
“Gina played a great game,” McInnis said. “She played really hard.”
And Ogazi’s presence in the paint opened the door for everyone else to get involved.
“We got everyone on the scoreboard tonight, which was nice to see,” McInnis added.
Now the Lady Knights look to make up ground in the Olympic League as they prepare for road games against North Mason and Peninsula, which both topped BHS earlier in the season.
The North Mason game was last night, but scores were not available at press time. BHS will travel to Peninsula on Feb. 1.
