In their first week of district games, the Lady Dragons left no one questioning who dominated the court each night.  Extending their winning streak to 10-0, the Lady Dragons took down conference opponents from Aberdeen and West Side, beating both teams by a healthy margin.  Nearing the halfway mark of their season, Malad is determined to only improve their game as they go from one game to the next.

First hosting the Aberdeen Tigers in Malad on Wednesday, December 13, the Lady Dragons immediately jumped to an early lead in their first conference game of the season.  At the end of the first quarter, Malad found themselves up 22-0 due to their tough defense and fast paced offense.

Aberdeen attempted to slow down Malad’s game, but the Lady Dragon’s only used their play as an opportunity to focus their game on solid execution.  The Tigers were unable to shut down senior forward Hallie Horsley who “outscored the opposing team by herself with a near double-double of 18 points and nine rebounds,” as reported by the Idaho State Journal.  

Brynlee Jones added another 13 points in the game, hitting 5 for 8 of her field goal attempts and going 100% from the free throw line.  To add to their offense, Malad had a season high of 16 assists, led by Oaklie Hebdon with 7.  The Lady Dragons tallied up 45 rebounds as a team, more than doubling the Tiger’s 17.  Horsley and Izzy Haycock each grabbed 9, with Mikell Keetch coming up right behind with 8 more.  Olivia Nelson added 5 with Mady VanBebber and Hebdon bringing in 4 more each.  On the defensive end, the Lady Dragons had 9 steals and 7 blocks.  Extending their lead throughout the game, the Lady Dragons end the game up, 64-17.

Friday, December 15, the Malad girl’s basketball team traveled to district rivals, West Side where they not only swept the night, but each team ran up a considerable lead to run the clock in the 4th quarter of each game.

The varsity team had found a unique challenge in the Pirate’s line as they went up against 6’6” forward Holly Kropf.  Kropf had a simple plan for the game, post up big under the basket in hopes that her teammates could lob the ball up to her for an easy lay-in.  To counter West Side’s plan, the Lady Dragons played a tough defense on the guards to deny entry into the post.  If ever the ball managed to make it into Kropf’s hands, the Malad posts and weak side wings played big, hands off, straight up defense to put the pressure on the shot.  Working together, the Lady Dragons held Kropf to only 6 points.

To open the game, Malad set up in their full court press that led to a series of steal and

quick shots.  The team posted an impressive 16 steals over the night, with 3 each from Horsley, Haycock and Kiley Miller.  Hebdon led the team on offense, putting up 17 of the team's 52 points.  Haycock came in from the weak side to grab 9 rebounds to lead the Lady Dragons with Nelson, Horsley, Jones, Hebdon and Scarlett Hawkes each adding 4.

After their first week of conference games, Head Coach Trevor Jones shared, “Every game is important to us.  There is always something we can learn from and improve on.  We are very proud of how hard our girls worked this week as they went up against teams that play at a different pace of basketball.  With two more wins behind us we are focusing on what’s next- Ririe and North Fremont.  We have beat both of these teams at home but we know we have to push hard to win on their court.”

The Lady Dragons will play back to back games on the road, first going up against the Ririe Bulldogs on Wednesday, December 20 and then the North Fremont Huskies the following night.