GIRLS BASKETBALL: Lady Panthers end losing skid vs. Sparta

The Lady Panthers were suffering through a six-game losing streak heading into Tuesday night's home game with Sparta, but broke out of their funk in a major way with a 79-29 thrashing of the Lady Bulldogs, getting double-digit scoring efforts from five different players.

A 19-2 first quarter by Pinckneyville set the tone for the evening. The Lady Panthers scored at least 19 points each of the first three periods while holding Sparta to less than a dozen in all four.

"Yesterday was the best day of practice we've had all year, bar none," said Pinckneyville head coach Alan Engelhardt. "I will give them credit, for the most part, we've still practiced fairly hard even though we've been struggling on game nights. Yesterday carried over, we had a good day of getting after each other. We didn't split teams up between varsity and J-V, we went everybody on everybody, and I thought the kids responded well."

Leading the way for PCHS was Keelyn Stein, who hit three three-pointers on her way to a game-high 19 points. Joining Stein in double figures were Caitlyn Anderson (17 points), Sophie Keith (15), Andrea Morgan (12) and Kearsten Opp (12). Olivia Szczepanski (2) and Mayci Doerflein (2) also scored for Pinckneyville.

"Everybody has something that they do really well, and our kids got into areas that there are really good at scoring from tonight," Engelhardt said. "That's the best we've done all year at finding our areas, not trying to be something we're not. The other thing is we shared the ball better tonight than we've shared it all year."

Pinckneyville (8-13, 4-2) will begin play in the West Frankfort Mid-Winter tournament this Saturday.