By Jackson Russell
WALLAN Panthers’ women were blown out by the Sherbrooke Suns 89-62 in their first Big V Division Two fixture.
New recruit Carly Simons was the only Panther to reach double figures with 13 points and 13 rebounds, while captain Jayda Hunter had nine points, seven rebounds and four assists.
Wallan struggled to contain Sherbrook captain Rebecca Jones, who had a game-high 25 points.
While Sherbrooke got off to a strong start, Wallan was able to pull them back with a 22-15 second quarter to have a 35-33 lead at half-time.
The second half was all Sherbrooke, as the Suns put on 25 in the third and 31 points in the fourth period to run away with the win.
Turnovers were a killer for the Panthers, as Sherbrooke racked up 19 steals and scored 30 points from Wallan’s 31 turnovers.
Wallan coach Warren Taylor said the team probably wasn’t prepared for the physicality and pace of Sherbrooke.
“Sherbrook did a fantastic job of denying us, they pressed the whole game and that’s not something you see every day,” he said.
“We were down early and got ourselves back in front, played a solid second quarter and got some momentum but at half-time, Sherbrooke was able to regroup and blew us away again.
“Unfortunately, we couldn’t get into our offence or get to the spots we wanted to get the ball. When we did, we looked good but we were just outpaced, outmuscled and outhustled so we never really got our flow.
“We had a couple good individual performances, Jayda was good, Carly was great. Megan Marasco was great off the bench and gave us a real spark and Maddison Delbridge, who missed most of the season with illness, was asked for more than I expected of her and she really stood up.”
