After his team rolled to a 68-37 win over Ridgewood in an Inter-Valley Conference game, Hiland girls basketball coach Dave Schlabach acknowledged there were good things and some that weren't what he wanted. Ridgewood coach Doug Patterson saw the best 31-point loss his Generals have endured.

Both views were pretty accurate.

Hiland took the game over with a 14-0 run at the end of the first quarter that expanded the lead to 21-9 after the first possession of the second quarter, but also turned it over 21 times on the night to 14 for Ridgewood. The Hawks (3-0, 3-0 IVC) forced Ridgewood into a 16-for-44 shooting night and made 9-of-14 3-pointers.

"We weren't pleased with our defensive effort tonight," Schlabach said. "We played hard at times, but this was a disappointing night for us defensively. We shot the ball well, but we turned it over way too much. I thought we really played too fast at times. It was almost like we wanted to try to outscore someone."

For Ridgewood (3-2, 3-1), the 31-point loss was tempered by some positives. The biggest was the way the game started. The Generals jumped to a 6-2 lead and held a 9-7 lead after an artistic basket from Ashley Patterson. That was when Hiland took over. Hilary Weaver's 3-pointer from the top of the key gave Hiland its first lead at 10-9 with 2:46 left in the first quarter. It was like the Hawks got a shot of adrenaline once they took the lead.

Karli Mast, who led everyone with 17 points, drove the baseline and hit a jumper and Layla Miller hit a pair of free throws to push the lead to 14-9. At the end of the quarter, Hiland got a jumper from Gabby Fowler, followed by a deep 3-pointer from Weaver. At that point, the runaway was on.

"We've had that happen before with Hiland, where we start well and they just start shooting like that," Doug Patterson said. "We tried to stay in our 1-2-1-1 press and keep their wing players out wide. We did our best, but they still made nine threes on us. They're such a good shooting team, they are going to make plenty of them."

Even in the somewhat disappointing win, Hiland found some positives to take forward and some things to work on. The best sign for Schlabach was the way his players approached the fourth quarter, even with things well in hand. With two minutes left, Mykeila Mast threw herself on the floor for a loose ball, an effort that brought the crowd to its feet with more energy than anything else that happened Saturday.

"That was fantastic," Schlabach said. "Those are the type of energy plays we like to see. We need that whether it's practice or we're up 30 with two minutes left. That's the type of mentality we like to see."

In addition to the 17 points from Karli Mast, Hiland got 15 from Jena Stutzman and 11 from Katelyn Stuckey.