The Polk County girls held Hendersonville to just 2 points in the first quarter and never allowed more than 8 points in a quarter on their way to a 61-24 victory.

One might assume the Lady Wolverines were hitting on all cylinders.

Defensively Polk played extremely well, with their trapping pressure defense working to perfection all night. The defense resulted in 16 steals and probably forced just as many other turnovers (throwing the ball away, walking calls, etc.)

However, offensively Polk only shot 22 percent in the first half; which was good enough for a 25 – 10 halftime lead. They did improve their shooting percentage considerably in the second half scoring 24 points in the third quarter.

“It was kind of a tale of two games. In the first half we shot 22 percent and in the second we shot 38 percent,” Coach Craig Culbreth said. “We played pretty much the same both halves but that was the difference in the game. We (also) had a ton of steals.”

Another key to the win was that the normally undersized Polk found itself in an unusual position of having a height advantage. Coach Culbreth almost in disbelief said,

“We never had this before…. but we had a big height advantage. It’s very seldom we have a height advantage but we got a lot of rebounds (52) and got the ball down the floor (quickly).”

Katie Ruff led Polk with 13 points and 8 rebounds and Savannah Deaver had 8 points and led the team in rebounds with 11. Amber Lynch added 8 points as Polk had 10 players score in the contest.

Game Stats
Polk   13; 12; 24; 12 = 61
Hendersonville   2; 8; 8; 6 = 24

Aaliyah Waddell had 17 points and Emoree Rasheed had five for the Lady Bearcats (0-13, 0-7 WHC) Polk is now 9-8 overall, 3-4 in WHC conference play and face Madison away tonight. This will be the second meeting of the season with Polk losing the first game 57-45.