By Sam Brauen www.blufftonicon.com
(BLUFFTON) - The Lady Pirates improved to 8-3 at the halfway point of the regular season with a thorough thrashing of Upper Scioto Valley by a 74-31 score.  The Rams fell to 1-9 with the loss.

The Lady Pirates enter the second half of the season with an unblemished conference record at 3-0 and their next home game will be January 17 when they host Spencerville, a squad that knocked off the Pirates last season by a 55-50 count. 

Keys to the Game
Thursday’s game was never in doubt.  The visiting Rams scored the first two points but Bluffton scored the next 15 points, 11 coming from Katie Prater.  The senior connected on three shots from downtown in the first quarter alone.  Bluffton’s full court pressure defense forced 8 first quarter turnovers en route to the big lead.

By the 1:13 mark the Bluffton starters sat down but the points kept coming.  Laykin Garmatter and Ashley Eachus added second quarter points as the Pirates pushed the lead out to 37-15.  The Rams got a buzzer beater banked three pointer from sophomore Haylie Martin to cut the lead to 22. 

Bluffton got buckets from Brinkley Garmatter, Ashley Eachus, Averey Rumer, Kayla White, Libby Schaadt and Alivia Koenig in the third quarter and led 55-29 heading into the fourth. 

The Pirates scored the first 19 points of the fourth quarter and built a 45 point lead at one point. 

Individual Pirate Statistics (unofficial)

Katie Prater - 20 points, four 3s, 4 rebounds

Libby Schaadt - 14 points, 4 rebounds

Averey Rumer - 13 points, one 3, 7 rebounds

Alivia Koenig - 9 points one 3, 3 rebounds

Kayla White - 5 points, one 3, 1 rebound

Laykin Garmatter - 4 points, 1 rebound

Kylie Monday - 4 points, 1 rebound, 1 steal

Ashley Eachus - 3 points, 3 rebounds, 1 block

Brinkley Garmatter - 2 points, 2 steals

Kylie Stackhouse - 2 rebounds, 1 block

What’s Next
Bluffton will travel to Elida to take on the Bulldogs Saturday afternoon.