Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – It’s the kind of a stretch that can get stressful for a coach.

Two weeks filled with nothing but games against ranked foes and rivals.

It is also the part of the schedule top-ranked City High has been waiting all season for.

“It’s fun, we’ve been looking forward to this stretch,” City High senior Aubrey Joens said. “It’s very intense all the games are close and you know you have to bring your best effort every single game because these teams are all good and we know they are all coming for us.”

On Friday top-ranked City High remained unbeaten in relatively stress-free style fashion in its latest test during a rugged six-game stretch filled with four games against ranked opponents.

Joens scored 21 of her game-high 23 points in the final three quarter as City High overcame a slow start to pull away for a 57-32 win over West High (8-7) on Friday in a cross-town matchup at West High.

The win was fifth for City High (14-0) since last Tuesday with each of the first three coming against top-10 opponents and sets up a showdown with second-ranked West Des Moines Dowling (15-2) at 1 p.m. on Saturday at City High.

“West High is a really good team and there is no rest for the weary because we have some big ones coming up too,” City High Coach Bill McTaggart said. “I think our team has shown senior leadership at the end of games because we have been winning the fourth quarter and that shows our experience.”

City High forced West High into 23 turnovers and held the Women of Troy to single digit scoring outputs in the final three quarters while completing the season sweep of its cross-town rival.

The 32 points matched a season-low for West High which shot 29 percent form the field.

“They got a lot more physical with us and more aggressive and we weren’t very strong with the basketball and that’s a credit to them,” West High coach BJ Mayer said. “They took away a lot of our drives with their physicality and then we couldn’t create dribble drive kick outs. You have to give them a lot of credit.”

Audrey Koch scored eight points in the first quarter and West High limited the Little Hawks to 3-of-12 shooting with its 2-3 zone while taking an 11-8 lead.

West High led 16-10 following a Matayia Tellis 3-pointer 55 seconds into the second quarter.

It was all City High the rest of the way.

City High closed the first half on a 15-2 run to take a 25-18 lead and never let West High back into the game.

“After the first quarter we stepped it up on the defensive end and I thought that was probably the difference,” McTaggart said. “Rose (Nkumu), the last five games has taken the other team’s best player and made it hard for them to score and I thought she did that again tonight.”

Nkumu held Koch to just four points on 1-of-5 shooting over the final three quarters including just two points in the second half.

Meanwhile the City High offense got rolling behind Joens and senior Paige Rocca.

Joens had nine points during the 15-2 run to close the first half hitting all four of her second-quarter field goal attempts.

Rocca had eight points, including a pair of 3-pointers, during a 20-point City High third quarter that gave the Little Hawks a 45-26 lead.

“It’s definitely important to hit some shots especially when teams are guarding Aubrey Pretty heavily,” Rocca said. “When we can get the points spread across board then it makes it easier for Aubrey to get her points.”

After its slow start offensively City High shot 51 percent over the final three quarters.

Rocca finished with 11 points while Nkumu and Ella Cook each had eight.

“We had better movement we were doing one pass and shot and we talked about that,” McTaggart said. “We had to do a better job of getting it inside and that was our focus was to get it inside before the game and at halftime also.”

Next up for City High may be its toughest test yet in a string of games that has featured road wins at No. 7 Cedar Falls and No. 8 Waterloo West.

West Des Moines Dowling comes to Iowa City riding a nine-game winning streak after holding off No. 13 Ankeny Centennial 56-49 on Friday and features the state’s top scorer in Iowa signee Caitlyn Clark (34.3 points per game).

“We haven’t even talked about Dowling, I’ve watched game tape and tomorrow morning we will watch some tape and go through a few things,” McTaggart said. “It’s two decent teams going at one another and they have one of the best offensive players in the Midwest if not the country.”

Koch led West High with 12 point and seven rebounds and Tellis had eight points and nine boards.

City High        8  17  20  12  –  57

West High      11  7    8    6   –  32

City High (57) – Rose Nkumu 4-9 0-0 8, Kelsey Joens 0-6 1-2 1, Eviyon Richardson 2-6 0-0 4, Andie Westlake 1-2 0-0 2, Ella Cook 4-8 0-2 8, Paige Rocca 4-10 0-0 11, Aubrey Joens 11-16 0-0 23, Team 26-57 1-4 57.

West High (32) – Matayia Tellis 3-14 1-3 8, Cora Saunders 0-5 0-0 0, Liv Williams 0-1 0-0 0, Meena Tate 0-3 1-2 1, Grace Schneider 1-2 0-0 2, Jenna Saunders 2-4 0-0 5, Audrey Koch 4-11 3-4 12, Anna Prouty 1-1 0-0 2, Katelynn Hillberry 1-1 0-0 2, Team 12-42 5-9 32.

3-point field goals – ICH 4-20 (Nkumu 0-2, K. Joens 0-5, Westlake 0-1, Cook 0-1, Rocca 3-7, A. Joens 1-3), ICW (3-15 (Tellis 1-5, C. Saunders 0-4, J. Saunders 1-3, Koch 1-3). Rebounds – ICH 28 (Nkumu, A. Joens 6), ICW 36 (Tellis 9). Turnovers – ICH 6, ICW 23. Total fouls – ICH 11, ICW 11. Fouled out – None. Technical fouls – None.

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