The Winnemucca Junior High School seventh-grade boys basketball team remained undefeated on the year with four wins.
The Warriors (9-0) traveled to Fernley on Thursday, Nov. 20, and came away with a 38-22 win. Winnemucca made its home debut this past Saturday and won three times in Tri-County action. The Warriors knocked off Pershing County 43-2, McDermitt 56-21 and Battle Mountain 43-19.
"I am very happy with how we have played to this point in the season," said WJHS coach Todd Milton. "The guys are getting better and better each week. We have been working on playing together as a team and being unselfish when we play. I know that each of these boys can score almost every time that they have the ball in their hands, but if they want to continue to play basketball beyond junior high they need to learn to play as a team. They need to learn to run an offense, make good passes, work hard on defense and rebound on both ends of the floor. These guys are pushing themselves to do the right things on the floor, and I am proud of the progress that they have made."
This past weekend Derek Espinoza lead the team with eight assists for the three games, followed by Kobe Stoker and Tazmin Milton with five assists each. Stoker led the team in steals with five followed by Espinoza with four.
Jordan Parker paced the Warriors in rebounds with 16 (seven offensive and nine defensive) for the three Tri-County contests
"I feel that assists, steals and rebounding are the most important stats at the junior high level," Milton said. "It was a good weekend and everyone contributed."
Michael Casalez, Diego Villa, Preston Snow, along with Tazmin, Jordan, Espinoza and Stoker all had at least one assist, one steal, one offensive and one defensive rebound.
The coach added that Taylor Corak (two assists) and Max Mavity (three assists) both contributed with some nice passing at the point guard position. Bodi Miller (two steals) and Tyler Neu (one steal) both played solid defense and Josh Leveille had a strong weekend on the boards with four defensive rebounds and one offensive rebound.
"All of the kids want to score and I understand that, but they need to understand the importance of being a well-rounded player," Milton said. (Lowry) coach (Chad) Peters stressed this point when he visited the boys after the games on Saturday to congratulate them on a job well done."
In the four wins, Winnemucca averaged 67 percent from the free throw line, scoring 45 points per game, while holding the opponents to a 16-point average.
"I am happy about the 45-point average, but the part that I am most excited about is how well these guys play defense," Milton said. "This is a great group of boys and they work very hard on defense. We have only allowed one team all season to score more than 30 points and out of nine games played we have held the opponents to an 18-point average."
Winnemucca is off until Saturday, Dec. 6, when it travels to McDermitt for the next round of Tri-County play at 9 a.m.[[In-content Ad]]
