Salpointe keeps reloading. The program lost Jaya Nelson to graduation (South Carolina Aiken) after a runner-up finish in 2021 only to win the 4A state championship in 2022, but that meant losing Kylee Callahan (Knox College) to graduation and that was followed by a jump to the Open Division last year where the Lancers made it to the quarterfinal round. Taliyah Henderson led the program with 18.9 points a game as a sophomore last year but the team said goodbye to Bria Medina (Knox College) who was next in line with 11 points an outing.

This year, the team is loaded again with juniors including Henderson, Hannah Williams, Allison Even and Jordan Watts. Williams, Even and Watts are all averaging double figures and Henderson returned to the lineup Tuesday night after sitting out the beginning of the season with a knee injury. The team will also add Ironwood Ridge junior transfer Sydney Anderson, who came over to the Lancers with 956 career points at over 20 points a game.

Alessandra Egginton guards Taliyah Henderson. (Andy Morales/AZPreps365)

 

Salpointe beat Catalina Foothills 70-24 on Tuesday to improve to 6-1 in power-ranking games which put the team at No. 2 in 4A Conference and No. 5 in the Open Division. Anderson will be available next week, making things exponentially more difficult for their opponents.

Catalina Foothills is now 3-5 in ranking games and the Falcons are ranked No. 22 in the 5A Conference, which would normally put a team out of the running for the playoffs but the Open Division will pull at least eight teams out of the conference playoffs and then the next 16 teams will take part in the conference Play-In Tournament slated for February 17. So, at the very least, the top 24 teams will have a post season shot.

In the game at Salpointe, Even led all scorers with 16 points, Henderson added 12, Williams had 11 and Ajong Lual had nine. For Catalina Foothills, Clara-Mae Hrouch had 11 points, freshman Kayanna Chief had eight and Alessandra Egginton had five Hrouch passed the 1,000-point career mark earlier in the season as a junior.

More on the playoff scenarios HERE.