By RYAN ARENA

L’Observateur

EDGARD – The last time White Castle visited West St. John, the Bulldogs gave the Rams one of their toughest challenges of the season.

Apparently, they earned the Lady Rams’ full attention.

West St. John dominated from start to finish Thursday night in a 76-39 Class 1A regional round victory over their District 9-1A rival.

“We were very determined to win this game,” said Maya Trench, who scored 15 points for West St. John. “We saw the things we did wrong the last time out and corrected them tonight. We took a lot of bad shots last time, but tonight we did a much better job on offense.”

The victory propels West St. John (29-1) to the Class 1A state quarterfinals, where WSJ will host Hanson Monday night in Edgard. Hanson defeated Country Day, 47-43, in the regional round.

The game was nothing at all like the Feb. 5 clash between the teams, a 63-56 Rams win that saw White Castle winning at halftime and went down to the fourth quarter.

This time, West St. John stormed out to a 24-9 lead after the first quarter and took a 35-13 lead into halftime.

The Rams scored 70 points through the first three quarters and played its reserves throughout the fourth quarter. WSJ led by as many as 58.

West St. John has now defeated White Castle three times this season.

All five Ram starters scored in double figures. West St. John’s Jaylyn Gordon led all scorers with 26 points, including four 3 pointers. Jujuan Nicholas scored 11 while Donasia Bell and Deja Feist each scored 10.

Erica Jones led White Castle (16-15) with 13 points. Skylar O’Bear scored 11 and Shylar O’Bear scored 10.

West St. John hit 10 3-pointers in the game, five of those in a first quarter that set the tone. Gordon got things started with a deep 3 that made it 5-0. Bell sank one off an assist from Nicholas to push the Rams ahead 8-2. Gordon found Trench at the top of the circle for another 3 which made it 14-5, then Trench sank another from the corner shortly after to push it to 19-5. Bell hit her second trey of the quarter to close it out, off of a Nicholas pass, making it 24-9.

“We watched the film of the last game yesterday and we just played a lot of one-on-one ball, too much of it,” said Smith. “We did a better job of setting people up and moving the ball for a good shot.”

The game was all but over early in the third quarter when WSJ opened on a 15-2 run, highlighted by 10 points by Feist.

The Rams doubled their point total and outscored White Castle 35-8 in the frame.

Smith said that while the Rams made 10 3-pointers, his team didn’t rely on the outside shot this time, and therefore cut off a lot of long rebounds on missed shots and transition chances for White Castle.

“We shot well from the outside. We’ve been shooting it pretty well since the Donaldsonville game (Jan. 26),” said Smith. “They got out in transition on us last time, but tonight we didn’t take too many long shots. When we did, they fell.”

West St. John is now one win away from a return to the girls Top 28 tournament. The Rams have won 16 straight games.