The Lady Vikes beat the Gunn Titans 45-34 in its first league game of the season. The Vikings took the lead early in the game and by the end of the first quarter led 14-5.

As the game continued, Paly was able to maintain the lead. Early on in the second quarter Julie Chandler (‘17) drove to the basket, and after getting fouled made the first basket of the quarter. Chandler continued to score for the Vikings after she stole the ball and made a breakaway layup a few minutes later.

Maddy Atwater (‘16) also contributed for the Vikings, making a three soon after Chandler’s breakaway. She then went on to steal the ball soon after that. Not much later, she rebounded the ball and made her second three of the quarter right before the halftime buzzer.  At the end of the first half, Paly led 27-11.

Head coach Scott Peters thought that despite losing the lead in the second half, the  ladies were able to hold it together.

“We got up early in the first half and they came out in the second half and gave us everything they got and we kind of bent it, but didn’t break,” Peters said.

In the third quarter, the Vikings had many defensive plays including two blocked shots, three steals and several rebounds.  Paly still led the game after the end of the third quarter with a score of 36-20.

Although Gunn was able to close the gap a little in the fourth quarter, Paly still handled the pressure despite how physical the Titans were. Chandler believes that the Vikings did a good job stopping the Titans even though not all the fouls were called.

“Even though they were rough out there and the refs weren’t calling very many of their fouls, we kept fighting and pulled it through.”

Looking ahead, Peters believes one thing the team needs to focus on for the future is staying calm.

“I think we got to stay calm and if we run into some struggle we can’t let it affect our attitude and effort,” Scott said. “[ We got to] stay positive and keep playing hard. We know what we need to do and we got to practice it in practice to get better at it.”

Chandler agrees with Scott that a calm mentality will lead to success.

“I think staying calm is a good thing we need to work on because all future teams are going to play us in a similar defense as [Gunn] did tonight,” Chandler said. “So if we can stay calm, we can win.”

Paly will play next against Wilcox High School this Friday, Jan. 9 at 6:15 p.m. It will be the Vikings first away game of the season.