ISHPEMING — Coach Kurt Corcoran could easily put a scare into this Westwood High School girls basketball team on Thursday evening.

It worked as the Patriots raced to a 35-14 halftime lead in a 63-35 decision over the visiting Purple Hornets.

The scare came from L’Anse having recently beaten one of usual Upper Peninsula powerhouses, Houghton, by 15 points.

“I hadn’t seen any film on them, and I hear Houghton may be down a bit this year, but that still made my head turn a bit,” Corcoran said. “Any team coached by (the Gremlins’) Julie Filpus will at least play good defense.

“We used that as motivation in this game.”

While the Hornets scored the game’s first bucket, Westwood (2-0, 1-0 West PAC) quickly ripped off a 13-0 run to take control, leading 21-8 after one quarter.

“It was nice to get some players quality playing time who don’t have previous varsity experience,” the Pats’ coach said. “Some of our younger and more inexperienced girls were kinda nervous, but that’s to be expected.”

He added with only eight players this season, all hands need to be ready at any time.

While regular Madi Koski led Westwood scorers with 15 points, reserve Emily Nelson came in to score 10.

“Emily had a couple key steals, too, while Megan Johnson hit a couple nice baseline jumpers,” Corcoran said.

Karlie Patron led Patriots’ rebounders with seven, while Josie Rice paced L’Anse with eight points.

L’Anse won the JV game, though a score wasn’t available.

Scoring

L’Anse 8 6 7 14 — 35

Westwood 21 14 14 14 — 63

L’ANSE — Keinz 0-2-2, Mattson 2-0-4, Martinez 2-0-4, M. Rice 1-2-4, Voskuhl 1-1-3, Nankervis 3-0-6, Waara 2-0-4, J. Rice 4-0-8. Totals 15-5-35.

WESTWOOD — M. Koski 6-2-15, Leece 1-3-5, Patron 3-0-6, Miller 2-4-8, J. Koski 3-3-9, Gardner 2-0-4, Nelson 5-0-10, Johnson 3-0-6. Totals 25-12-63.

FG shooting: L’Anse unavailable; Westwood 25 of 49 (51.0 percent); FT shooting: L’Anse 5 of 15 (33.3 percent); Westwood 12 of 24 (50 percent); Rebounding: L’Anse unavailable; Westwood 32 (Karlie Patron 7).