Pirate Girls Beat Sunrise Mtn, Lincoln County

By GANNON HANEVOLD

Moapa Valley Progress

With one regular season game and a rare Saturday home matchup last week, the Moapa Valley High School Girls Basketball season continued heading in the right direction.

The Pirates started the week on the road on Tuesday, Jan. 15, against the Sunrise Mountain Miners. After a slow start, the Pirates were quick to jump out of their usual full court pressure against the Miners. Trailing 10-3 on the road, the Pirates were in a hole they were prepared to climb out of.
“It just seemed like we were off on everything we were doing,” said MVHS head coach Brandon Jones.

“We were probably trying to do too much too fast. We had a lot of good starts in a row so we were probably due, but the good thing was that we were causing turnovers so it didn’t get too bad.”

The game marked a milestone for senior Lainey Cornwall: her 100th game in a Pirate uniform.
But it was her fellow guard Kaitlyn Anderson who seized the reins on this game. Anderson, who went on to finish with 21 points, carved up the Miner defense and brought the Pirates to a 26-21 lead at halftime.

In the third quarter, Moapa began to pull away, causing more and more turnovers and taking a patient approach to the offensive end. By the start of the fourth quarter, the Pirates had put the Miners in a 19 point hole.
The Pirates held on for a 55-40 victory, jumping to 2-0 in the regular season.

Jones commented on what he believes sparked the outburst by Anderson. “Sunrise Mountain has a player who we called in practice the ‘Sunrise Mountain version of Kaitlyn,’” he said. “So I think she wanted to show her who was better.”

Then on a rare Saturday afternoon game, the Pirates played, out-of-league, against the Lincoln County Lynx. Earlier this season, the Lynx and Pirates met in the Mesquite tournament where Moapa Valley comfortably handed Lincoln County a loss. This time around, it was clear from the start who was in control.

The fans could barely blink before the Pirates were already building an insurmountable lead. In less than five minutes, the score had jumped to 17-0 in favor of Moapa Valley. It would be 19-2 at the end of the first quarter.

The Pirate full court pressure wreaked havoc on the Lynx and set the tone for the game.
“The first time we played them, we pressed them with a different press and had a lot of success,” said Jones. “So we knew we wanted to put a lot of pressure on their guards. We ended up using a more aggressive press that worked even better than the first.”

After a second quarter where the Pirates “coasted,” in the words of the team’s coach, it was 29-10 at halftime.

A smothering third quarter extended the lead even further. Outscoring their opponent 22-4 in the third period, Moapa Valley, led by Lainey Cornwall, ran away with the victory. The final score would be 53-22.
Remarkably, Cornwall finished with 24 points, single-handedly putting up more points than the entire Lynx offense.

Anderson finished with 13, and with what Jones illustrated as a “revolving door” role.
The team’s third leading scorer this time around was the junior Kaitlyn Hopkins.
“That was probably the first time this year she’s been that third scorer,” Jones said of Hopkins. “So I was excited for her.”

“There were a lot of girls that didn’t score that had great games as well,” Jones added. Emilie Barraza finished with five assists, four rebounds, and four steals off the bench for the Pirates.

Moapa Valley will take on league opponents Sky Pointe and Chaparral this week in a busy few days of basketball.