Perryville junior Aby Amberger scored a game-high 25 points to lead the Lady Pirates (5-5) to a 69- 42 victory over host DeSoto on Jan. 8.
Perryville coach Jason Dreyer said things were a little hectic at the start.
“We came out early in the game, and we got in a lot of foul trouble,” Dreyer said. “I think we had three starters with two fouls, about 3 or 4 minutes into the game, so our bench — Ava Robles and Lilly Cowell and Halie Fritsche — came in off the bench and they played really, really well. They extended the lead for us.”
After the first quarter, Perryville held a 7-point lead, and by halftime, the Lady Pirates were up 34-20.
“Then in the second half, we were really aggressive on the offensive end and attacked the basket and were able to separate ourselves a little bit to give us a comfortable lead.”
By the end of the third quarter, the Lady Pirates were up 49-32. They outscored DeSoto 20-10 in the fourth to set the final margin.
Sophomore Paula Sticht was the only other Lady Pirate in double digits, finishing with 10 points, while junior Janie Porter had 8. Robles and Zoe Hoehn had 7 points each.
Dreyer said he had made some adjustments after his team’s previous game, a tough 58-36 loss to Hillsboro.
"We just talked about being a lot more aggressive on offense," Dreyer said. "That's kind of what we worked on in practice, is our transition, trying to get out and run and getting ourselves more opportunities on the offensive end. And that’s what we did against DeSoto.”
In the Hillsboro game, Porter led the Lady Pirates with 10 points, while Hillsboro was led by Ashley Hilton with 20.
