Marietta freshman Kendall VanderWal missed her first four three-point attempts in Tuesday night’s Twin States League showdown with arch-rival Warren at Sutton Gymnasium.

The Tiger rookie point guard wouldn’t miss again as she canned her next seven three-point attempts to lead Marietta to a 69-40 win over the Warriors.

Five of VanderWal’s triples came in the second half as the Tigers blew open a relatively close ball game to secure victory No. 14 in their so-far perfect season.

“Our freshman stepped up big time for us tonight and hit some big shots,” said third-year Tiger head coach Ryan McClain. “She is very mature, has a short memory and she sure doesn’t play like she’s a freshman.”

The win secured at least a tie for the TSL title for the Tigers while a win over Point Pleasant on Friday will give them sole possession of the league championship.

Marietta rolled to a 32-point win over the Warriors back in early December in Vincent but early on it looked like Warren may give them quite a bit more of a challenge this time around.

Much like the weather outside, the Tigers came out of the gate ice cold as they made just one of their first eight three-point shots in the first quarter.

Marietta still managed to take a 14-11 lead at the end of the first quarter.

“We came out a little flat and you know that Warren is going to come out and play really hard,” said McClain. “I tip my cap to their effort tonight because they were right up in us and they pressured hard and made it hard on us that first half.”

The Tigers began to heat up a bit in the second quarter as they scored the first nine nine points to open up a 12-point lead.

Leigha Lauer got the run started with a two-pointer before fellow senior Jacey McKnight canned a three-pointer.

Sophomore Braxtyn Kroft got in on the act with an assist from McKnight before senior Alyssa Baker’s short jumper capped the nine-point run.

Warren momentarily broke the Tigers momentum on a two-pointer by Sarah Pettey but VanderWal got it right back by draining back-to-back three-pointers on consecutive Tiger possessions to give the home team a 29-13 lead.

At that point in the game it would have been easy for the Warriors to let things get completely out of hand but they rallied in the final minute and a half of the second quarter to cut the lead to 10 at the break.

A free throw by Pettey followed by a two-pointer by Jayda Murray got them a bit closer before senior Mackenzie James-McGuire closed out the half by splashing in a long three-pointer to cut the lead to 29-19 at the beak

After heating up in the second quarter VanderWal took no time at all to find her form in the second half as she canned three triples in the first four minutes of the quarter to push the Tiger lead back out to 16.

A late 6-0 run sparked by four points by Baker extended the Tiger lead to 22 before Pettey’s two-pointer closed out the third quarter.

Lauer, who leads the Tigers in scoring on the season was held pretty much in check found her groove in the final quarter as Marietta blew things wide open.

Lauer scored 12 points in the final eight minutes of play including a pair from behind the arc while VanderWal rang the bell twice more from long distance as the Tigers pulled away to the win.

After the slow start from the three-point line early in the game the Tigers made 10 of their last 17 shots from behind the arc.

VanderWal finished with 25 points to lead all scorers while Lauer and Baker added 21 and 16 points respectively.

Baker and VanderWal each grabbed six rebounds to lead the Tigers while Lauer also had five boards and four assists.

McKnight was held to just three points in the game but the Tiger defensive standout came away with five steals and dished out five assists while Baker led them in steals with seven.

“Our whole group are great kids and they all do it together,” said McClain. “They get pumped to see other kids do well and I love that about them.”

The Warriors were led in scoring by James-McGuire with 19 including three from behind the arc while Pettey added 10 points and a team-high eight rebounds.

Warren (7-4, 1-2 TSL) had not played a game in nearly two weeks but played well at times against a very good Marietta team.

“We started off great, we were right there competing with them and doing a good job defensively staying with them,” said Warrior head coach Brad Venham. “They were able to break us down a little bit in the second quarter and then they started hitting some shots and they obviously have some very talented shooters.”

With the unfortunate loss of sophomore Aubrey Pepper for the season to injury, the Warriors have still put together an impressive season so far.

“We are looking to improve and we still have got some things to work on but two losses are not going to define our season,” said Venham, whose team will host Fort Frye on Friday night. “We’ve just got to keep our heads up and get back to work.”

The Tigers will look to keep things rolling Thursday when they travel to Wheeling Park with still more goals to accomplish.

“This is one of our goals and if we can take care of business with Point Pleasant we can be the first team boys or girls to sweep the TSL,” said McClain, whose team sits at 4-0 with only the two games with Point Pleasant remaining in league play. “We are happy with the outcome, we’ve just got to keep plugging along.”