Lady Warriors Fall Short in Season Opener

 The opening game for the girls' varsity basketball team was likely a night the team will wish to forget as they were hammered by the host Stoneham Lady Spartans 65-24, giving them a disappointing 0-1 start to the season.

Right from the tipoff, Stoneham attacked Wakefield, jumping out to an 11-2 lead less than two-minutes into the game. The Lady Spartans would keep their foot on the gas pedal for the duration of the night, showing no mercy on Wakefield. When the score at the end of the first half was 31-2, the Lady Warriors knew at that point it was going to be a long night.

Head coach Megan O'Connell took the opportunity provided in this game to get every player on her roster some solid playing time, and seemed to use this as more of a learning experience than anything.

"After such a tough start, we wanted to try and focus more on just executing things better both offensively and defensively and just continue to work hard, and I think as the game went on the girls definitely did that," said O'Connell.

While the numbers may not have been huge, the Lady Warriors did get some scoring from a number of different players. Junior guard Ashley Carney led all Wakefield scorers with six points. Fellow junior guard Abby McGrath was second behind Carney as she netted four points and grabbed two rebounds. Senior captain Aimee Reynolds chipped in three points, as did senior forward Margaret Hartrey. Sophomore forward Kristen Callahan added two points, and then a trio of freshmen rounded out the scoring for Wakefield as Karina Vargas, Kristie McNall and Rachel Hamilton all added two points of their own.

Wakefield did seem to settle in and play better as the game went on, improving a bit in each quarter. They had a much stronger second half, holding Stoneham to only 23 points while scoring 13. With just a ten-point margin separating them from the Spartans in the second half, Wakefield showed some encouraging signs as they were able to execute offensively at a better percentage and frustrate Stoneham at times with a solid 2-3 zone defense.

"I definitely think we got better later on in the game and the girls were able to start executing on offense and creating some good shots," said coach O'Connell. "I was encouraged that they never stopped working. You know we have a pretty inexperienced team, and I think they were caught a bit off guard by the pressure they were throwing at us, but they definitely kept at it, so hopefully the girls learned from it and it will make us a better team because of it."

The Lady Warriors will welcome in Lexington High School on Friday for their at the high school, and hope to notch their first win of the season on their own court.