The Carson girls' basketball team opened up conference play in grand style Friday at Morse Burley Gym, taking a 63-21 victory over the Hug Hawks in its Sierra League opener.
Nicole Scott had a game-high 16 points, fellow senior Catherine Brekken added 12 and every Senator saw good playing time as Carson improved to 5-9 overall, 1-0 in league.
"It's always good to open up (league play) with a win," Carson coach Ric Garcia said. "We obviously had a height and quickness advantage. We've played a lot of games (already) and playing at home is always an advantage."At least it is when you open up like the Senators, who took a 12-2 lead with just over 4 minutes left in the opening period.
After Carson took a 15-5 lead into the second period the 6-foot-2 Scott, who has signed a National Letter of Intent to play at Eastern Washington, scored on a putback and a layup before dishing off to Rosella Nunez to extend the lead to 21-5.
"Nicole's been out a month-and-a-half--since the week before Christmas. She's learning how to work with everyone," Garcia said. "We had a 6-inch - if not a foot - height advantage out there. Our hope with Nicole and Catherine is if one misses, the other rebounds."
Scott said she was the beneficiary of several good assists from Nunes, Brekken and Brandi Vega.
"As a team we ran our offense and opened up the post a lot," she said. "Our point guards did a good job of getting it in to me."
The lead grew to 36-13 by halftime and 54-19 by the end of the third. Abby Rankl's basket at 2:33 stretched the lead to 52-14 and Hug never got closer than 35.
Garcia said his team's size advantage and fresh legs enabled it to put away the Hawks.
"We were trying to get it inside. We didn't want to be jacking up threes," Garcia said. "We haven't had a game where we haven't played everyone (on the team). What we tryto do is leave it all out there. That way somebody else who is fresh can come in. They're clones. They all have similar abilities."
Next up for Carson is a rematch tonight with McQueen, whcih took a 48-40 win over the Senators earlier this season. The game will begin at 6 p.m. at Carson.
"It's going to be a tough game," Garcia said. "It will tell us if we are improved. It will be a good judge of whether we are the same, better or worse. I know they (McQueen) have gotten better. "