The Sacred Heart Valkyries are ranked highly in their home state, and on Monday they took on another highly ranked team in the form of the Sidwell Friends Quakers. Sacred Heart took a 53-48 hit to the loss column at the hands of Sidwell Friends. Sacred Heart has been going strong on the season, but this is now their second defeat in a row.
When it comes to explaining why Sacred Heart lost, one person who can't be blamed is ZaKiyah Johnson. Despite the final result, she scored 26 points. That was a full 54.2% of Sacred Heart's points, marking the third time in a row she's earned more than a third of the team's points. The team also got some help courtesy of Addison Kincaid, who scored four points along with two steals.
Leading Sidwell Friends to victory were Kendall Dudley and Zania Socka. Dudley scored 16 points along with seven rebounds and four blocks, while Socka scored 22 points along with eight rebounds and two steals. Socka continues to roll, besting her previous point total in each of the last three games she's played. Another player making a difference was Jayla Jackson, who scored 13 points along with two steals.
Sacred Heart's loss dropped their record down to 11-6. As for Sidwell Friends, their win bumped their record up to 9-2.
Sacred Heart will be playing in front of their home fans against Bedford North Lawrence at 7:00 p.m. on Thursday. Hopefully Bedford North Lawrence focused on turnovers this week since the team gave up five last Saturday. Sidwell Friends won't have much time to rest: their next game is against St. Andrew's Episcopal at 5:45 p.m. on January 16th. St. Andrew's Episcopal is on a three-game streak of home wins, Sidwell Friends a nine-game streak of away wins (dating back to last season)-- so someone will have to leave a streak behind on the court.
