photo by: Chris Duderstadt

Lawrence High senior Leslie Ostronic (4) stays in fron to Wyandotte junior Shaiy'onna Carter (25) in the first half of the Lions' 58-11 victory on Tuesday at LHS.

As the Lawrence High girls basketball team prepared for its final game of the 2018 calendar year, the Lions did so with plenty of motivation.

Sure, the Lions wanted a home victory over Wyandotte on Tuesday, and they got one in a 58-11 rout of the Bulldogs. But along with striving to defeat Wyandotte, LHS has made sure to keep in mind its recent slow starts to Sunflower League play.

The Lions (3-1, No. 10 in Class 6A) prepared for Wyandotte just as they would for any top-tier league foe, and it showed on Tuesday. LHS stifled Wyandotte into turning it over 27 times, and spread the wealth offensively with nine different players scoring.

“I like the way the girls shared the ball. We have an extremely unselfish team,” head coach Jeff Dickson said. “It’s always a good thing, but sometimes we want some of them to be a little bit more aggressive and a little bit more selfish. It’s just hard because that’s just how they are.

“I like the fact that we were able to come out and get stuff going in the post a little bit earlier. That has been a struggle for us.”

It’s no secret that the Lions’ top priority on the offensive end has been to feed seniors Chisom Ajekwu and Sammy Williams down low. Ajekwu led all scorers with 12 points, but one of the Lions’ other goals against the Bulldogs was to not rely on their one-two post punch.

Senior Hannah Stewart and junior Sophie DeWitt highlighted the Lions’ offensive balance by taking advantage of their open looks from the perimeter. Stewart drilled three 3-pointers to account for all nine of her points, and DeWitt added two trifectas for six of her eight tallies.

“I love that she has enough confidence to be able to shoot at the varsity level,” Stewart said of DeWitt. “I think the more that the three of us (Stewart, DeWitt and senior Leslie Ostronic) keep working in practice on our shooting, the more we’ll see fall, as well.”

Although Ostronic missed her two shots from behind the arc, she played a pivotal role in the LHS offense by getting her teammates involved. Ostronic consistently made the extra pass, and finished with five assists to go along with her eight points. Dickson was proud of Ostronic for making heads-up plays, but the LHS senior did acknowledge his earlier point.

“I’m actually one of the ones he tells to pass less, but tonight, I just saw a lot of them down low because there were a lot of gaps,” Ostronic said. “The bounce pass was there.”

After LHS built a 40-5 halftime lead, sophomore Ozi Ajekwu and freshman Layla Harjo scored six and five points, respectively, in the third quarter to keep the Lions rolling. Sophomore Amaya Harris then scored all four points for the Lions in the fourth when there was a running clock.

The Lions won’t play again until traveling to Gardner-Edgerton (1-3) on January 4 for their Sunflower League opener.

“We’ve had a history since I’ve been here that we’ve gotten off to really bad starts (in league play). We’ve been 0-2, 0-3 right off the bat and knocked out of the league race right from the beginning,” Dickson said. “We started out 0-2 last year and were able to battle back and get second in the league and went 10-1 the rest of the way. I’d much rather us come out and be up 2-0 or 3-0 and be able to really battle and have a chance to win league.”

Lawrence 19 21 14 4 — 58

Wyandotte 3 2 2 4 — 11

Lawrence (58)

Hannah Stewart 3-8 0-0 9, Leslie Ostronic 3-6 2-2 8, Sammy Williams 2-5 0-0 4, Sophie DeWitt 3-5 0-0 8, Layla Harjo 2-4 0-0 5, Evann Seratte 1-3 0-0 2, Ozi Ajekwu 3-5 0-2 6, Chisom Ajekwu 6-12 0-3 12, Paiden Bell 0-1 0-0 0, Jocelyn Wilson 0-0 0-0 0, Tracy Allen 0-1 0-0 0, Addison Gish 0-2 0-0 0, I’waya Brewer 0-0 0-0 0, Kayla Galbreath 0-0 0-0 0, Kylie Lamb 0-1 0-0 0, Amaya Harris 2-2 0-0 4, Lexi Dutcher 0-2 0-0 0. Totals: 25-57 2-7 58.

Wyandotte (11)

Shaiy’onna Carter 4-13 0-0 9, Maliyah Roark-Dudley 1-6 0-0 2, Elizabeth Garner 0-3 0-0 0, Bao Yang 0-1 0-0 0, Jess’Ka Walker 0-5 0-0 0, Jackie Rios 0-2 0-1 0, Kaisa Njeru 0-3 0-2 0, Aaliyah Fuentes 0-1 0-0 0, Daeja Young 0-0 0-0 0, Brenna Jones 0-0 0-0 0, Aysha Alexander 0-0 0-0 0, Jala Adams 0-0 0-0 0, Zoey Anderson 0-0 0-0 0, Havanna Robinson 0-0 0-0 0, Jennifer Rios 0-0 0-0 0, Ivyon Dupree 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 5-34 0-3 11.

3-point goals: Lawrence 6-15 (Stewart 3, DeWitt 2, Harjo 1); Wyandotte 1-11 (Carter 1). Turnovers: Lawrence 8, Wyandotte 27. Fouled out: None.