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South Jordan • Generally, things don't look all that good when a team goes through a quarter of a basketball game with more turnovers than points.

And that's the position the Copper Hills Grizzlies found themselves in going into the second period against host Bingham, having scored all of five points while coughing up the ball eight times.

But Copper Hills, ranked fourth in Class 4A, overcame the early difficulties to take an important 43-30 road win over the Miners.

It was only the first meeting of the season between the rivals, but the participants already looked very familiar with each other and how to thwart the other's offensive efforts.

"It's even more than you know. A lot of these girls are friends and several of them play on club teams together," said Grizzlies' coach Ben Morley after the Region 3 win. "We obviously scout each other throughout the year, and I think both teams look forward to it."

Bingham (6-7, 1-1) was up 9-0 in the first quarter after a three-point play from Siera McNicol and a basket by Journey Tupea finished off the opening run. The Miners were also sharp defensively as Copper Hills had difficulty just getting into its offense.

"We've unfortunately made that a bit of a habit starting games," Morley said. "I felt we were a bit hesitant, not attacking and not shooting with confidence like we normally do.

"Once we settled down a little bit, I thought we were pretty good," he added.

Copper Hills (10-2, 2-0) finally broke into the scoring column with an old-fashioned three — score and a foul shot — by Lenisi Fineanganofo with 1:32 left in the first.

Still down 12-5 to start the second, the Grizzlies opened the quarter with Kate Sisler draining a 3-pointer. After Tupea answered with a bucket, Sisler hit another trey to make the score 14-11 as Bingham's early advantage started to vanish.

The visitors grabbed their first lead three seconds before intermission as sophomore Breanna Gillen found Kiarra Gasu open for a layup and a 20-18 halftime edge.

"It's a tough gym to play in. There's a lot of banners and you see how many wins they have," said Sisler, who finished with 13 points. "You've just got to come in knowing that we have a good team, they have a good team and it's going to be a battle."

Gasu and Taela Laufiso started the third quarter with buckets as Copper Hills took a six-point lead.

Meanwhile, Bingham was in the throes of an almost seven-minute scoreless stretch. The Miners were led by McNicol's 11 points, but she was in foul difficulty and eventually fouled out with 3:34 left in the fourth.

"Both teams are really good in defensive transition. We weren't gonna give them anything easy and they weren't gonna give us anything easy," Morley said. "It's always this type of game. You know, we've had games where we've won by 40 points and that's always fun.

"But these games where you have to play hard and smart are especially sweet," the Copper Hills coach added. —

Copper Hills 43, Bingham 30

R Copper Hills went more than six minutes into the contest before scoring and trailed 12-5 after the first period.

• The Grizzlies were led by Kate Sisler's 13 points.

• Bingham was paced by Sierra McNicol's 11 points while Shanyce Makeui had a dozen rebounds.