Jamillia Ross has a game-high 22 points in leading Blue Hills past Randolph, 56-37.
RANDOLPH – The first play of the game Thursday was a sign of what was to come.
The Blue Hills Regional High girls basketball team controlled the tip, and Jamillia Ross sprinted the other way, corralled an outlet pass and finished at the rim for an uncontested two. Just four seconds had passed, but the Warriors (7-0) already held a lead.
They didn’t trail the entire night, running past Randolph (3-5) for a 56-37 win. The sophomore guard Ross exploded for a game-high 22 points, including 14 in the first half, helping the Warriors get out in transition early and often.
“We’re pretty quick,” Blue Hills head coach Tom McGrath said. “We have a couple good ball-handlers, and we do a good job of passing the ball.”
The Warriors were relentless on the defensive end, swatting several Randolph shots, keeping the ball inbounds and racing the other way for easy buckets. When they had to set up in the half court, it wasn’t a problem, as they buried shots from the outside and added plenty of second-chance points.
Blue Hills burst out to an 18-8 edge after one quarter, pulling ahead 13-4 early and establishing the tempo it wanted to play at. Ross canned a 3, junior Ariel Carter (14 points) stuck a floater and the Warriors made the Blue Devils pay for leaving them open outside the paint.
“It’s always a little bit of a challenge when you’re playing teams that hit unexpectedly from the outside, which we didn’t account for,” Randolph head coach Ashley Barron said. “We did a nice job of trying to stop the play inside, but we got beat on the boards, and the team that wins the boards usually wins the game.”
The trend continued in the second quarter, and Ross gave Blue Hills a 28-18 halftime lead after nailing a 3 in the final minute off a feed from Lexi Miller. Ross was aggressive in transition, too, converting multiple runners and looking for her teammates on the break.
After the Warriors extended their lead to 36-21 midway through the third, the Blue Devils went on a 9-4 run spanning five minutes from the end of the third to the beginning of the fourth. Randolph trailed 39-25 through three, but freshman Anne-Lucie Pierre (14 points) and sophomore Johnae Jambu kept the Blue Devils afloat.
The Warriors needed a bucket to shift the momentum, and they got not just one – but two – from senior captain Yamelia Medina. Medina had been quiet most of the game, but she hit two crucial 3-pointers in a span of one minute to put Blue Hills ahead 46-32.
Randolph cut it to 10 twice, but it never got within single digits in the fourth.
Blue Hills didn’t turn in a flawless effort, but it did what it had to do stay undefeated.
“We played well in spurts,” McGrath said. “We’re not where we want to be yet. I give a lot of credit to Randolph. They’re well coached, and they’re a very scrappy, tough team. Our girls played well enough to win.”