SOPHOMORE EMILY BROSSARD (CENTER) GETS DOUBLE-TEAMED BY A PACK OF DENAIR COYOTES DURING THE VARSITY GIRLS’ WIN ON MONDAY NIGHT. SENIOR BROOK BARRETT (LEFT) ASSISTS ON THE PLAY.THE GRIZZLIES’ NEXT HOME GAME IS FEB. 8. GAZETTE PHOTO BY JILL BALLINGER Mariposa’s varsity girls’ basketball squad halted its sixgame Southern Athletic League slide Monday night with a 41-23 walloping of Denair’s Coyotes on the MCHS home court.

The Lady Grizzlies began their SAL campaign with a 3-0 mark, but were besieged with a season-ending injury to at least one starter, Jackie Brondolo, and senior Julie Wurzbach is still out with an ankle injury.

Senior forward Patricia Schellentrager broke the ice for Mariposa in the opening quarter when she hit a 5-foot jumper from the center paint for a 2-0 lead.

Three straight buckets by senior guard Brook Barrett pushed Mariposa’s bulge to 8- 0 befores sophomore Emily Brossard’s lay-up with 59 seconds left in the quarter made it 10-0. Barrett snapped the net again from the top of the key to end the period with the Lady Grizzlies holding a commanding 12-0 lead.

Mariposa’s scrambling defense forced Denair into a bundle of turnovers and kept the Coyotes off the scoreboard until the 6:03 mark of the second stanza.

With 3:51 left in the first half, freshman Carissa Leonard snatched an errant pass and drove the length of the court for an uncontested lay-up and a 14-2 Mariposa margin.

The Coyotes switched to a defensive press, but Mariposa managed to move the ball well. With 1:52 left in the half, Brossard took an assist from Barrett and banked it through the iron, and just 40 seconds later added another lay-up to boost the Lady Grizzlies’ lead to 18-5.

With 24 ticks left on the clock in the second quarter, Denair scored in the paint, before Mariposa’s Jin Anderson sank a free throw to finish the first half leading 19-7.

The Lady Grizzlies blew it open in the third period with a 16-point barrage while the Coyotes could muster just 7 points and trailed, 35-14, going into the final stanza.

For the game, Barrett banged in 15 points, Schellentrager hit for 9, and Brossard worked the paint for 8 points.

Last Thursday, Mariposa hosted arch-rival Le Grand, and dropped a 36-24 SAL contest.

Mariposa held a 16-13 lead at the intermission, but the wheels fell off in the third period as the Lady Grizzlies could push just a single point through the net while the Bulldogs reeled off 13 to take the lead.

Barrett led all Mariposa scorers with 9 points, and Emily Darcy added 3.

“We haven’t had a consistent double-digit scorer all season,” said head coach Al Brondolo. “We run into these quarters where we only score 2 or 4 points, and it’s killing us, so we are still working on scoring with some regularity.”

Mariposa traveled to Delhi Thursday, and hosts Waterford on Monday in the pair of league matches.