Highlands Opens Season with Impressive Win

PHOTO: Allen Ramsey, DWCPhoto.com. Highlands sophomore Ashley Hayes fires up a shot in the Hoops for Hunger scrimmage. Highlands beat Scott, 70-57 to open the season Monday.

The Highlands girls basketball team opened its season with a nice 70-57 win over the host Scott Lady Eagles on Monday in Taylor Mill.

Junior Zoie Barth performed as well as she has in five seasons on the varsity scoring 32 points on 8-of-16 shooting including 5-of-9 from three-point range and hitting all 11 free throws. Barth also recorded five steals. But freshman Rory O'Hara had a huge varsity debut scoring 16 points on 7-of-13 shooting and nabbed seven rebounds.

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Highlands made 22-of-50 shots from the field for 44 percent including 7-of-21 from three-point range for 33 percent. Scott made 20-of-51 shots for 39 percent and 6-of-17 from three-point range for 35 percent. Highlands also made 19-of-23 free throws for 83 percent compared to 11-of-17 for 65 percent for the Lady Eagles.

"Teamwork is really what we're all about," O'Hara said. "It's great having teammates that are all scoring and helping each other score. It's not a one-man show. We're in it together. We all have confidence in each other that we can become great."

Highlands won the rebounding battle, 32-28 and distributed the ball well with 15 assists. Barth, Hanna Buecker and Olivia Gessner had four assists each.

"It was a good team win," said Jaime Walz-Richey, Highlands Head Coach. "We had players do things on the court that won't necessarily show up on the stat sheet."

Scott saw three players reach double figures. Anna Clephane led the way with 26 points with Laci Reinhart and Summer Secrist scoring 11 each.