WATERTOWN — Just two quarters of solid basketball was needed for the Watertown High School basketball team to pick up a much-needed victory.
After both the Arrows and Huron Tigers struggled to score in the first quarter, Watertown jumped out to an 11-point halftime lead and cruised to a 41-30 Eastern South Dakota Conference victory on Thursday night in the Civic Arena.
Watertown snapped a four-game losing streak to improve to 4-13 overall and 4-9 in ESD. Huron dropped to 0-19 and 0-15, respectively.
“Huron is a tougher team than 0-19,” said Watertown head coach Tom Mattingly. “They’ve had some close games against quality opponents. I thought we executed defensively taking some of their threats out of the picture. Eventually we had to make some 3s but I didn’t think we took as many early ones as we did in the past.”
Senior wing Taylor Terronez added: “I thought we played really well as a team, moving the ball and just creating looks for each other.”
Terronez was influential in shutting down Huron’s offense. Early on, the Tigers looked to attack the paint with guards Jayda Shillingstad and Havyn Heinz. Terronez came up with three blocked shots in the first quarter, helping the Arrows hold the Tigers to just four points.
Huron scored the first basket of the second quarter but Watertown responded with a 7-0 run to open up the lead. The Arrows went up 22-13 with 1:30 left in the half and closed with a Jackie Tetzlaff basket on a feed from Anni Cummings just as the first half came to a close.
It didn’t take long for Watertown to extend the lead, eventually finding itself up 19 points. The Arrows scored just two points in the fourth quarter, mostly running clock by passing it along the perimeter, and came out on top.
For Huron, head coach Wade Stobbs said the game was pretty simple: it’s hard to win games when you don’t hit many shots.
“We just have to knock down some shots,” he said. “We got some decent looks at times, they just didn’t fall for us. We held them to 41, and that should be enough to be competitive enough in ESD. Fifty points is what you try to get to. If you can get 50 points you’re going to be competitive and win some games, but we have to get there.”

The victory was a necessary one for the Arrows. A loss would’ve prevented Watertown from earning increasingly important seed points to stay at No. 16 in the Class AA Round of 16. With a win, though, it has a chance to climb higher in the standings.
“We’ve been saying it for a while now,” Terronez said of the importance of Thursday’s contest. “We need to go on a streak and looking at the seeding, this could be the start of it all. Since we started this now we can keep this going.”
Cummings led all scorers with 15 points. Terronez added 11 to go with five rebounds and three assists. Megan Fannin tallied 10 points and five boards.
Heinz paced the Tigers with eight points and four rebounds. Shillingstad and Gracie Schoenfelder each had seven points with Schoenfelder corralling a game-high eight rebounds.
Huron will close out the season next Friday at Brandon Valley.
Watertown turns around today (Friday) with a game at Yankton. In the previous meeting, the Gazelles shot a blistering 65 percent to come away with a lopsided victory. Terronez and the Arrows are hoping Yankton misses a few shots this time.
“Yankton did not miss any shots the last time we played them,” said Terronez. “Hopefully now we can get on our streak, take it to them and get the win this time.”

Huron     4 13 20 30
Watertown     9 24 39 41
HURON: Gracie Shoenfelder 3 0-0 7, Jayda Shillingstad 3 0-0 7, Havyn Heinz 2 3 1-2 8, Sam Shoultz 2 0-0 4, Tenley Buddenhagen 1 2-2 4. Totals 12 3-4 30.
WATERTOWN: Jackie Tetzlaff 1 1-2 3, Anni Cummings 4 2-2 15, Taylor Terronez 4 0-0 11, Megan Fannin 4 0-1 10, Meghan Heggelund 1 0-0 2. Totals 16 3-5 41.
Three-point goals — Huron 3 (Shoenfelder, Shillingstad, Heinz), Watertown 6 (Terronez 3, Fannin 2, Cummings). Total fouls — Huron 13, Watertown 7. Fouled out — None. FG shooting — Huron 12-42 (29 percent), Watertown 16-41 (39 percent). Rebounds — Huron 21 (Shoenfelder 8), Watertown 31 (Tetzlaff 6,Terronez 5, Fennin 5). Turnovers — Huron 12, Watertown 16. 

NATHAN GIESE/WATERTOWN PUBLIC OPINION
Huron’s Tenley Buddenhagen hits a shot over Watertown’s Megan Fannin during their Eastern South Dakota Conference girls’ basketball game in the Civic Arena on Thursday.

Huron’s Havyn Heinz puts up a shot against Watertown’s Taylor Terronez during their game Thursday at Watertown Civic Arena.