Girls district basketball: Highland comes out firing in win over Westlake

GRANGER TWP. — Rust is for losers who don't take care of their stuff.Playing its first game in 15 days Wednesday, the Highland girls basketball team had a built-in excuse for a slow start. The opposite happened, as the well-oiled machine that is the second-seeded Hornets used precision and relentless speed to leave 29th-seeded Westlake in the dust to win 72-41 in an extremely impressive Division III, Northeast 5 District semifinal performance.Highland (21-3), which led the Demons (8-16) 47-19 at halftime and obtained a running clock midway through the third quarter, advanced to play seventh-seeded Rocky River (20-4) at Triway on Saturday afternoon. The Pirates swept Westlake 67-39 and 63-32 in Cleveland West Conference play but will have a lot to deal with if the Hornets play this way again."We definitely came out with super high energy, super ready to play," point guard Grace Shondel said after belting the Backstreet Boys song "I Want It That Way" with a group of teammates in the back hallway. "I just think our mentality now is you lose and you go home. We all want to be here and all show up every day wanting to get better." There was pretty much nothing for eighth-year coach James Madison to complain about in the first half. Highland scored the first 15 points, pressed like mad women, played relentless switch-everything man defense in the half court, rebounded well and, considering the program's years-long reputation for streaky shooting, made seemingly everything it threw at the north rim.The highlight-reel start belonged to locked-in wing Rowan Kildoo (19 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists, 5 steals), who had eight points, three rebounds and two assists in the opening 3:25. The first half was otherwise dominated by Shondel, who finished with 10 points, four rebounds, six assists and four steals and hounded standout Westlake point guard Ella Stanton to such a degree that center Husney Najjar was forced to bring the ball up the court.Jordyn Caples also starred defensively with four steals, Madi Morgan (11 points) had four blocks in the first quarter, Emeri Gausman scored nine of her 11 points in the first half and Sophia Madison banked home three full-speed layups in transition."This team, we knew we had to jump on them really quickly," Kildoo said. "We played really good defense against them, and we got off to a really good start."Making jumpers off the dribble and catch-and-shoot mid-range jumpers at a high rate, Highland finished the first half 18-for-37 from the floor (.486), 3-for-7 from 3-point range (.429) and 8-for-10 at the foul line (.800), where the Demons never had a chance to score from all evening. As if that weren't enough, the Hornets made 8-of-14, 1-of-3 and 1-of-1 in the third quarter to get a running clock and allow the starters to cheer on the backups from the bench.The performance was a stunning 180-degree turnaround from a mild upset loss to Berea-Midpark on Feb. 10 in which Highland shot 3-for-29 in the second half. It also bore no resemble to a nail-biting 53-49 district semifinal triumph over Uniontown Lake last season in which the Hornets played poorly but were saved late by now-graduated Grace Weber.Stanton scored six of her 16 points in the fourth quarter to go with six rebounds and three assists to lead Westlake and Najjar was solid with five, four and four, but the Demons didn't have the horsepower to keep up with high-octane Highland.Actually, they got lapped."Practice is really important," Kildoo said. "We practiced really hard because we knew what we were getting ourselves into. It's the playoffs, so it's lose or go home. We're going to do everything we can to win."Contact Albert Grindle at (330) 721-4043 or agrindle@medina-gazette.com.Highland 72, Westlake 41Division III, Northeast 5 District SemifinalWESTLAKE 8 11 9 13 — 41HIGHLAND 25 22 18 7 — 72Westlake — Liana Ostrowski 2-0-4, Anika Feldkircher 2-0-4, Husneya Najjar 2-0-5, Sophie Taylor 2-0-5, Ella Stanton 7-0-16, Nora Primrose 1-0-3, Amelia Barone 1-0-2, Lina Ghanem 1-0-2. TOTALS: 18-0-41.Highland — Rowan Kildoo 6-5-19, Madi Morgan 5-1-11, Emeri Gausman 5-1-11, Jordyn Caples 1-0-2, Grace Shondel 4-0-10, Scarlet Gordon 0-2-2, Sophia Madison 4-0-8, Alaina Weingart 2-0-4, Bridget Cope 0-0-0, Kennedy Lawson 1-0-2, Maddie Ricciuti 1-0-3, Claire Hartschuh 0-0-0. TOTALS: 29-9-72.3-point goals — Stanton 2, Najjar, Taylor, Primrose, Kildoo 2, Shondel 2, Ricciuit. Rebounds — Westlake 22 (Stanton 6), Highland 25 (Caples 5). Assists — Westlake 9 (Najjar 4). Records — Westlake (8-16), Highland (21-3).