Lady Braves bowl over Cedar Park; gain weekend split

The La Conner High girls’ basketball team put on a lot of miles last weekend before stalling out at Nooksack Valley.

Fueled by an impressive 62-39 road win over Cedar Park Christian on Friday, the Lady Braves sped to a 24-21 halftime lead Saturday against 1A Nooksack before sputtering late in a 47-40 non-league loss.

“I think it was a case of how hard it is to get back-to-back wins on the road as we develop our depth,” La Conner head coach Scott Novak said after the Nooksack game. “We ended up running out of gas a little bit in the second half at Nooksack.”

With the loss, the Lady Braves fell to 3-2 as they entered Tuesday’s late NW2B test with Orcas.

La Conner resumes its non-conference schedule Dec. 21 at South Whidbey.

“The schedule isn’t too kind to us right now with all the away games,” said Novak, “but it all kind of evens out. Last year we benefited from having quite a few early home games.”

La Conner felt right at home at Cedar Park, though.

Nakiya Edwards drained seven deep treys, two during a pivotal 16-2 La Conner spurt in the second quarter, en route to a game-high 25 points.

Edwards also dished off three assists and grabbed seven rebounds for the victors.

She was joined in double figures by frontliner Ashley Watkins, who scored 11 of her 17 points in the first half, and finished with a team-best 13 rebounds.

Point guard Kamea Pino ignited the La Conner attack with six assists and helped jump-start the Lady Braves transition game with four steals.

Salome Yosef had 15 points and Hailey Carlson added another 14 to lead Cedar Park.

Pino hit on all cylinders at Nooksack as well.

She led La Conner with 19 points, carrying the offensive load in the second half. Pino tallied 12 of La Conner’s 16 points after the break, including a pair of treys in the third quarter when she was the lone scorer for the Lady Braves.

La Conner had bolted to an early lead behind superb outside shooting from the Edwards sisters.

Nakiya hit a trio of three-pointers in the first half, while Nakesha buried two more.

Pino added seven points at the break.

But it proved not quite enough against a balanced and talented Lady Pioneer team, whose roster features six seniors.

Katrina Gimmaka and Olivia Berkan led seven Nooksack players in the scoring column. Gimmaka had 14 points, 10 in the first half when she helped keep the Lady Pioneers in the game.

Her teammates came to the rescue in the second half. Berkan, who scored 13 points, meshed three treys after halftime.

Six-foot-one senior post Brianna Turner scored four of her six points down the stretch.

“Nooksack Valley,” Novak said, “is a really, really good team.”

And, for much of the weekend, so was his club.

“Overall,” Novak said, “I think we played pretty solid. Things are coming together pretty well for us.”