Pruitt, Wilhite lead Chaffee girls basketball team to an 87-53 win over Meadow Heights

PATTON, Mo. -- There wasn't much that could stop the Chaffee girls basketball team from scoring against Meadow Heights on Monday night.

Led by senior Jordan Pruitt and freshman Kylie Wilhite, who both hit six 3-pointers and scored more than 20 points, the Red Devils cruised to an 87-53 rout of the Panthers at Meadow Heights High School.

"The thing with me and Jordy [Pruitt] is that usually I'm on and she's off, or she's on and I'm off," said Wilhite, who finished with a career-high 26 points to lead Chaffee. "We were both on, so that kind of made it easier to go back and forth and share the ball with one another. We haven't had a game where we were both on this year, so it's pretty amazing. At halftime, we were both kind of freaking out and saying, 'We've never done this before,' It's a great feeling."

Chaffee (19-5) never trailed against Meadow Heights (7-15), jumping out to an 11-0 lead with 4 minutes, 57 seconds to play in the first quarter.

The Red Devils hit three shots from behind the arc during that span. Pruitt had two and Wilhite added another before senior Emma Cook got the Panthers on the scoreboard with a layup at the 3:07 mark.

Meadow Heights senior Kiana Hotop added two free throws a minute later, but Chaffee responded with a 12-4 run, sparked by Pruitt's back-to-back treys for a 26-6 lead with 1:38 to go in the first.

Each team added four more points in the final minute of the opening quarter, which ended with the Red Devils holding a 20-point lead.

"That's what I asked them to do from the beginning," Chaffee coach Darrin Pruitt said. "I wasn't feeling real great coming into this game, and I told them, 'Just make it to where I don't have to coach a whole bunch and we'll be good.'"

Pruitt scored 13 points in the first and was 4 of 6 (66 percent) from the 3-point line. The guard went unguarded for most of the first quarter and into the second quarter, eluding defenders and finding a groove on the right side of the court.

"That's pretty much what I always do," Jordan Pruitt said. "It doesn't always work for me, but if it doesn't, I just pass it off to one of my teammates. That worked a lot tonight because it seemed like everybody was scoring. And after the first shot when I went by everyone, I just kind of noticed it so I took advantage."

Cook said the Panthers knew Pruitt would be a key player they needed to guard. Even when they did, Pruitt knocked down shots.

"Well, we went in to this knowing that she was a good shooter," Cook said about Pruitt. "But she shot lights out in the first half. She didn't miss. At the second quarter, our coach told us we needed to have one girl just stay on her at one time. And that helped, but hands in her face all around, she drained the 3 tonight."

Pruitt said his daughter's performance and ability to get open wasn't surprising.

"We didn't see the open looks, she saw them. I didn't have to coach her one bit on that," Pruitt said. "She's been playing since second grade, so she knows the game and when to get open and exploit a defense."

Meadow Heights came out strong at the start of the second quarter, scoring the first 10 points, including treys from Hotop and Abi Bristow, which cut the lead to 30-20 with 6:06 remaining. But that was as close as the Panthers came.

Chaffee answered with a 10-2 run to extend its lead to 40-22 with 3:38 to play in the first half.

Bristow added a free throw after being fouled with 2:54 left before the break, but an 11-3 run propelled the Red Devils to a 51-26 lead at halftime.

Wilhite hit two 3s and added a layup during Chaffee's final run of the first half. She was 6 of 12 from beyond the arc in the game and ended the night 10 of 18 (56 percent) from the field.

"I've never really expected to score that much as a freshman," said Wilhite, who also had 10 rebounds. "At the beginning of the season it was kind of intimidating, and then the girls kind of calmed me down. So I really owe it to them and the coaches for helping me out."

Wilhite hit a jumper 40 seconds into the second half and Pruitt chipped in a minute later with her sixth trey of the game to spark a 15-7 run to extend the lead to 67-32 with 3:25 to go in the third.

Pruitt scored her final two points of the game with 1:41 left in the third before calling it a night along with the rest of Chaffee's starters.

Pruitt shot 8 of 16 (50 percent) from field and is just three points short of the career 1,000-point milestone.

Meadow Heights outscored Chaffee 17-16 in the fourth, but was playing with a running clock for a majority of the final quarter.

"At halftime, we switched up our offense and ran more of a drive offense instead of trying to hit the outside shot," Cook said. "In the first half, we weren't hitting from out there very consistently. The adjustments helped us, but it was way too late for anything."

The Panthers were just 3 of 11 from 3-point range and shot 30 percent (20 of 66) from the field.

Hotop finished with 25 points to lead Meadow Heights while Bristow added 11 points and Cook chipped in nine.

Julia Sutterfield had a team-high eight assists for Chaffee, which has two games remaining on its regular-season schedule. The Red Devils are two wins away from reaching their season goal of eclipsing 20 wins, according to Pruitt, who said his team has a lot more basketball to play and is peaking at the right time.

"It's a good time of the year to be coming on strong like that," Pruitt said. W"e've been giving teams trouble all season, and I expect that to continue this postseason."

Chaffee 30 21 20 16 -- 87

Meadow Heights 10 16 10 17 -- 53

CHAFFEE (87) -- Kylie Wilhite 26, Jordan Pruitt 23, Carleigh Burnett 11, Julia Sutterfield 8, Mattison Cline 7, Hannah Seyer 4, Kaitlin McFerron 4, Hallie Bollinger 2, Lindsey Harrell 2. FG 35, FT 3-5, F 11 (3-pointers: Wilhite 6, Pruitt 6, Burnett 1, Cline 1. Fouled out: none.)

MEADOW HEIGHTS (53) -- Kiana Hotop 25, Abi Bristow 11, Emma Cook 9, Kylee Whitener 2, Sammantha Miles, Jaycee Whitener 2, Jacque Starkey 2. FG 20, FT 7-10, F 9 (3-pointers: Hotop 3, Bristow 2, Cook 1. Fouled out: none.)