Dekaney bursts into the postseason
Dekaney took care of business.
The District 15-6A champs opened the Class 6A girls basketball playoffs Monday with a 72-31 win over The Woodlands.
The Highlanders, winners of four straight district titles from 2011 to 2014, were a bit down this season, but they’re still the Highlanders, so coach Stacey Stroman was happy to put that one behind them.
“You get to this point, beating anybody is big,” Stroman said. “You’ll take it and be happy to move forward.”
Stroman said, overall, she was happy with their effort in their first playoff game.
“Take away the first quarter, and we played real good defense, which created a lot of offense for us,” she said.
Junior guard Jasmine Smith led three scorers in double digits with 19 points.
“She struggled outside but did a real good job of getting offensive rebounds and attacking the basket in the second half,” Stroman said. “We had a 32-point run in the third quarter and she was a big factor in that.”
Senior point guard Jaeyln Richard-Harris added16 points.
Next up for Dekaney is a showdown with Austin Westlake at 7 p.m. Thursday at A&M Consolidated.
“We’ve scouted them,” Stroman said. “They’re very smart, they have really good shooters, they execute well (and) they’re very patient, so we definitely are going to have to play four quarters.”
And with the playoff opener out of the way, Stroman’s confident they will.
“We started off slow (Monday) night,” Stroman said. “We only scored eight points in the first quarter. We couldn’t buy a basket. I don’t know if it was playoff jitters our what, but we struggled early, and then we settled in a little bit in the second half and played more of our style.”