By K.D. Norris
ken@wktv.org
The second game of a long OK-Conference schedule may have been too early to be called a must-win game for the Wyoming High School girls basketball team, but the Wolves Tuesday, Jan. 14, home-court win over then undefeated Wayland was a really good win.
Wyoming (4-5 overall and 1-1 in OK Gold) used a balanced scoring attack and some clutch defense down the stretch to score a 73-63 win over the Wildcats (8-1 overall, 1-1) and give the Wolves a little momentum in conference play.
“Our conference is so tough, Wayland was 8-0 coming in … East Grand Rapids is one of the top teams in the state … anytime we go into our conference, it is a battle,” Wolves coach Troy Mast, now in his fifth year at Wyoming, said to WKTV after the game. “It was early in the season, but we play every game as if it were the last game of the year.”
In the Wayland win, the Wolves were led by 20 points — including six 3-pointers — from senior McKenzie Ruppert and 15 points from fellow senior Mikayla Petree. But they also got 12 points each from junior Taejah Cross and sophomore Michelle McGee, eight points from sophomore Mikayla Marzean and six points from sophomore Marissa Menard.
“Our kids were ready tonight,” Mast said. “I am so proud of how they performed and took care of each other and played so hard.”
That balanced scoring, from experienced upperclassmen and still-developing sophomores, has been a strength of Wyoming so far this season.
“We do not have one girl we can count on … but we feel like we have five, six, seven girl who can score on a given night,” Mast said. “We just want to win. It doesn’t matter who scores.”
In addition to seniors Ruppert and Petree, the Wolves are also led by senior Aniyah Jones. Other juniors on the squad include Charde’ Fudge, Naomi Goodson and Delfina Hernandez-Key. In addition to McGee, Marzen and Menard, other youth on the team include sophomores Jenna VanderPloeg and Avery Jirous, and freshman Treyah Cross.
“We have senior leaders … Mikayla Petree has been on the varsity for four years … and each year she has taken on more and more responsibility,” Mast said. “But we also have some young kids who can play. We feel like that, as we go though the season, if we can balance those two together, we’ll be alright.”
While Wyoming lost four of seven non-conference games, Mast said there were lessons learned from close, early-season losses to the likes of Forest Hills Central, Grandville and Rockford.
“We felt like we played a tougher (non-conference) schedule than most teams in our conference,” he said.
The Wolves will be at Grand Rapids Christian (7-1, 0-1) for another conference game Friday, Jan. 17.
The Wolves were 8-13 last season and were 5-7 in OK-Conference Gold play. This season the coaching staff includes assistants Julian Goodson (the junior varsity head coach) and Eric Brown.
The Wyoming vs. Wayland girls and boys games were a WKTV Sports Featured Games and is available on cable television and on-demand at WKTVlive.org.
WKTV broadcasts on Wyoming and Kentwood cable channels. On Comcast cable, Channel 25 is the Community Channel, where sports events and other community events are shown; On AT&T cable throughout the Grand Rapids area, viewers go to Channel 99, and then are given the choice to watch Wyoming (or Kentwood) Community (Channel 25) or Government (Channel 26) channels.
For complete schedules of programs on WKTV channels, see our Weekly On-air Schedule.
