Kenai and Klawock were looking for their first win in the George Houston Capital City Classic on Sunday and the Cardinals got their wish 45-27 over the Chieftains.

Kenai juniors Ellsi Miller and Willow Graham scored right out of the gate for the Cardinals and Klawock eighth grader Jayla Edenshaw did the same for the Chieftains, but Kenai held a 17-7 lead after eight minutes.

Kenai freshman Bryleigh Williams and sophomore Gracee Every also got into the early scoring as did Klawock senior Kaiya Marvin who helped the Chieftains close the deficit in the second quarter to seven points 22-15.

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CAPITAL CITY CLASSIC COVERAGE:

Day 1: Chugiak girls run past Kenai | Federal Way gets past Soldotna 63-40 | 4A Crimson Bears girls topple 1A Chieftains | JDHS boys beat Cordova

Day 2: Chugiak girls defeat Klawock | Federal Way wins against Cordova | 4A Crimson Bears girls topple 3A Cardinals | JDHS boys battle in extra time with Soldotna

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A steal by junior Keira Sanderson gave the Chieftains four shots as they kept rebounding their misses, but Miller took the ball for Kenai and scored before the buzzer for a 24-15 lead at the half.

Klawock scored on their first two possessions of the second half to cut the lead to 24-19, but Miller got both those scores back with Miller connected from deep and junior Mckenzie Spence inside to keep Kenai in control.

“Definitely it was great meeting all the players and stuff, all super nice,” Kenai’s Spence said. “Definitely we need to work on a lot of stuff but overall I think we did pretty good, except we could do better on our plays. We mainly focus on our defense more so we just need to run more plays and stuff.”

Kenai led 31-21 starting the final stanza and the Cardinals exploded for 14 points in the final eight minutes including two shots from past the arch by Miller and Williams.

Klawock found four points in the stanza from Sanderson and a basket from Armour.

“Overall from the tournament we know we have to work on defense and getting back,” Klawock coach Joseph Sanderson said. “Our rebounding has been pretty good defensively, we have to work more on the offensive rebounds. And then just talking more, they have to talk on the court more. I don’t know why they are so quite. This last game was fun. We just couldn’t get nothing to fall. We played really good defense I thought, got good rebounds, just couldn’t get any points.”

Miller led Kenai with 19 points, Williams added eight, Graham six, Spence four, and Every, senior Sierra Hershberger, sophomore Savannah Hershberger, freshman Hallie Songer two each.

The Cardinals hit 2-4 at the free throw line, the Chieftains 2-6.

Marvin led Klawock with nine points, Armour and Sanderson six apiece, Edenshaw four and eighth grader Alli Demmert two.

“We learned some definite things we need to work on,” Kenai coach Jake Songer said. “We have no where to go but up. Everyone has loved coming to this tournament and the hospitality has been great and how much they have been willing to show us the city, they provided meals, yeah, everyone has been super happy with coming to this tournament. It has been excellent.”

Girls Tournament Scores:

FRIDAY: Chugiak 43, Kenai 34; JDHS 71, Klawock 21.

SATURDAY: Chugiak 45, Klawock 25; JDHS 57, Kenai 13.

SUNDAY: Kenai 45, Klawock 27; JDHS vs. Chugiak (late)