By Hub City Times staff

SPENCER – The Columbus Catholic girls basketball team improved to 2-3, with a 44-30 win over Spencer in Eastern Cloverbelt Conference action Dec. 5 at Spencer High School.

“Any time you get a conference win, it feels good,” Columbus Coach Ron Wilczek said after the game. “There were some things that maybe need improvement, but there also were some things that I’m incredibly proud of the girls for doing, especially in the second half. Hats off to Spencer. They came out ready to play. New first-year coach, and she’s (Krystal Weier) got them playing hard. They were taking it to us early.

“We tracked some things on the bench for halftime discussions. We talked about offensive rebounds, how many paint touches are they getting, how many are we getting, and they were getting a lot of both. And at halftime I challenged the girls, in terms of ‘You know what? You need to play a little tougher. It’s not X’s and O’s. It’s about wanting it more than they do,’ and they responded in a big way.”

After trailing 20-16 at halftime, the Rockets scored the first two baskets of the second half to tie the game. But the Columbus defense held the Rockets to just 10 points the rest of the way, outscoring Spencer 24-14 in the second half.

Addison Baierl led the Dons with 17 points. Emmalee Jicinsky added 12. Spencer was led by Heavyn Kind and Aryiah Schuh, each with eight points.

The win snapped a three-game losing streak for Columbus, while the Rockets suffered their second straight defeat in dropping to 2-3. The win by the Dons was their seventh straight over Spencer, and their eleventh in 13 contests with the Rockets dating back to 2013.