Wright City overcame a double digit halftime deficit to win their season opener over South Callaway last week. 

Wright City outscored South Callaway 35-19 in the second half to overcome a 10-point halftime deficit in their 53-47 home win Dec. 1. Wright City head coach Doug Smith said Wright City’s “careless turnovers” in the first half contributed to the deficit. 

“We gave them a lot of points by just throwing the ball away,” Smith said. “And so one of our messages at halftime was make the easy passes. Take care of the ball. Let’s not throw the ball away. But keep at it. Keep coming, keep coming, keep coming, keep coming. Wear them out.” 

Smith noted South Callaway did not have the depth Wright City had on their bench. 

With 6:24 remaining in the third quarter, Wright City trailed 33-20. The Lady Wildcats outscored South Callaway 16-5 over the rest of the quarter to trim the deficit to two points heading into the final quarter. Wright City’s strong third quarter play was capped off by Shiriah McRoberts’ three point field goal at the buzzer. 

McRoberts also hit a pair of three point field goals to put Wright City ahead for good in the fourth quarter. She hit a three point field goal with 6:38 remaining in the final quarter to put Wright City up by one. After South Callaway tied the game on a free throw, McRoberts connected on another three point field goal to put Wright City up 44-41. They led the rest of the game. 

“That’s what I try to tell her. Just keep shooting,” Smith said. “She’s going to get hot at some point and so it was about just keep putting the ball up. Don’t worry about the misses, just keep coming. And when she hit a couple of those threes there just to get us going, that was big. The one at the end of the (third) quarter though was obviously a big momentum boost.”

Wright City junior Paige Rees kept the Lady Wildcats in the game in the first half. She scored 10 of Wright City’s 18 first half points. Rees led the Lady Wildcats with 18 points in the game. McRoberts also reached double figures. She scored 14 points. Kaedyn Johnson hauled in 18 rebounds for Wright City, including 13 rebounds on the offensive end. 

Smith credited Danika Graham’s defense on South Callaway’s McKenzie Laughlin as a key factor in Wright City’s win. 

“Number 15 (Laughlin) for them was a really good ballplayer,” Smith said. “I mean, a really good ball player… I thought her defense on (number) 15 was a big key to that.”

Smith said the opener was “the first early version of what we want to do.” He stressed they want to put a lot of pressure on the ball and get up and down the floor as much as possible to try to get some easy baskets. 

“That’s gonna be a process of learning,” Smith said. “All we do in practice is we’re going and that’s kind of starting to get ingrained in us a little bit is just to go. And that’s kind of just how we play and we want to play that way. It’s easier to start turning that off as you move into the later stages than it is to suddenly turn that on. So we want to play that way and then if we need to learn to back down, we can.”

Wright City is slated to play at Winfield at 7 p.m. Dec. 8.