Fernley girls rebound from first loss

Robert Perea, The Fernley Reporter

Having suffered their first loss three days prior, the Fernley High School girls basketball team took out is frustrations on Dayton and South Tahoe last weekend with a pair of easy wins.

The Vaqueros opened league play with a 65-19 win over Dayton last Friday, punctuated by a 31-3 second quarter in which the Vaqueros continually harassed the overwhelmed DustDevils with fullcourt pressure and halfcourt trapping.

They continued in much the same vein the next afternoon, again converting pressure defense into easy offfense to roll to a 64-39 win over South Tahoe.

The Vaqueros were coming off a 68-52 loss to Bishop Manogue on Tuesday, their first loss of the season to a team they had beaten in the second weekend of the season.

“In the Manogue game, we made too many unforced turnovers and missed opportunities,” coach Ralph Dunn said. “Just wasn’t ready to play, and that’s the way practices have been.”

Dunn said he challenged the team to be better at practice and do things at game speed, and leading up to their two wins last weekend they showed up with more confidence and better work ethics at practice.

“At times we played really well, especially on defense, and had some girls step up on both ends of the court,” he said.

Junior Jaelece Wasson was honored before Friday night’s game for becoming the fifth girl in Fernley High School history to score 1,000 career points. She reached that milestone over the Christmas break, when the Vaqueros were playing in the Varsity Elite Tournament at McQueen.

Wasson and each of the other 1,000 point scorers were presented with a basketball with their career point totals imprinted on it. Jamie Wagner, who graduated in 1999, was the first player to reach the milestone in and is the school’s all-time leading scorer among girls with 1,520 points. Walita Querta, Wasson’s mother, of the Class of 2004, was the second player to score 1,000, finishing with 1,055 for her career. April Shaw, a 2007 graduate, scored 1,018 points, and 2009 graduate Jayme King had been the most recent member of the 1,000-point club with 1,058 points.

All but Wagner played for Dunn. Wasson played as a freshman for Tom Kingston before Dunn returned to the bench last season when Kingston stepped down.

“Nice to see those girls that reached that milestone get some recognition,” Dunn said.