Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – West High was slightly sloppy at times in its second meeting this month with cross-town rival City High on Friday.

Class 5A No. 13 West High shot just 35 percent from the floor, went more than five minutes without scoring to open the second quarter and was just 4-of-19 from 3-point range against the Little Hawks on Friday.

However, when you’ve lost two games in a row any win looks like a masterpiece.

West High got 16 points from Meena Tate and eight points and 12 rebounds from senior Anna Prouty while snapping a two-game losing skid with a 49-30 win over the Little Hawks in front of a large crowd at West High.

“We definitely needed this one,” Prouty said. “The last few games have been rough so we definitely needed it and the rest of the season we need to carry the momentum on.”

West High did plenty of things well on Friday while completing the regular season sweep of the Little Hawks an improving to 12-5 on the season.

The Trojans held a 38-25 rebounding edge, grabbed 13 offensive rebounds and held City High to single digit scoring outputs in each quarter.

Add it all up and it was enough for West High to get its first win over a Mississippi Valley Conference foe since a January 10 win over Dubuque Hempstead.

“All the rivalry stuff aside we needed a win,” West High coach Nate Frese said. “That’s what we wanted tonight to be about is lets just do our stuff well. We know what they are going to do, we scouted them but let’s just make it about us these next four or five games.”

Tate scored seven of her game-high 16 points in the opening quarter as West High wasted no time taking control.

The senior guard scored the first six West High points and had a conventional 3-point play during a 9-0 run that gave the Trojans a 17-5 lead after the first quarter.

“I watched a lot of film of our last game against them and often times it looks like you are being guarded but you are really not so I wanted to exploit that,” Tate said. “I realized I was open a lot and was able to make some shots.”

West High struggled to get any offensive rhythm in the second quarter and didn’t score until freshman Grace Fincham converted a layup on a back door cut with 2:28 left in the first half.

The Trojan defense kept City High from cutting into the lead and West High led 24-12 at the half.

City High got as close as nine points on two occasions in the third quarter but West High responded with an 8-1 run to close the quarter.

Prouty scored six of her eight points in the third quarter, twice scoring following offensive rebounds.

“They don’t have a lot of size and we arguably don’t have a lot of size but we have good rebounders,” Prouty said. “We have people who like to rebound and hustle so we felt like we had an advantage there.”

Tate helped put the game away scoring seven points during a 10-2 West High run to open the fourth quarter.

“She had nine points in the first quarter and nine in the first quarter does help set a tone,” Frese said. “She had nine in the first quarter, zero in the second, zero in the third and seven in the fourth and I would say our best two quarters were the first and fourth.”

City High dropped to 3-12 on the season with its fifth consecutive loss.

Emmy McComas had 11 points and nine rebounds for the Little Hawks while Augie Palmer had 10 points for City High.

City High                     4   8     9   9   –  30

West High                  17   7   13  12  –  49

City High (30) – Augie Palmer 5-14 0-0 10, Mia Driscoll 1-3 0-0 2, Lauren Koch 0-4 0-0 0, Norah Jespersen 0-2 0-0 0, Emmy McComas 4-7 1-2 11, Halle Larew 1-4 0-0 2, Tessa Driscoll 1-9 3-4 5, Totals 12-43 4-6 30.

West High (49) – Lucy Wolf 0-2 2-2 2, Meena Tate 6-15 3-3 16, Carolyn Pierce 3-5 0-2 8, Melae’ Lacy 1-6 4-4 6, Keiko Ono-Fullard 1-6 0-0 3, Anna Prouty 3-7 2-2 8, Grace Fincham 3-7 0-0 6, Totals 17-48 11-13 49.

3-point field goals – ICH 2-20 (Palmer 0-5, M. Driscoll 0-1, Koch 0-4, Jespersen 0-2, McComas 2-3, Driscoll 0-5), ICW 4-19 (Wolf 0-1, Tate 1-5, Pierce 2-3, Lacy 0-2, Ono-Fullard 1-5, Fincham 0-3). Rebounds – ICH 25 (McComas 9), ICW 38 (Prouty 12). Turnovers – ICH 12, ICW 10. Total fouls – ICH 11, ICW 11. Fouled out – None. Technical fouls – None.

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