An annual high school basketball rivalry will be renewed tonight in Wellman, as the Washington Demons will face the Mid-Prairie Golden Hawks in a doubleheader you can hear on KCII. The evening starts with the girls’ game, which has been won by Mid-Prairie in seven of the last eight meetings. Washington comes into this season’s matchup with a 7-9 record, but a win Friday night over Burlington snapped a 6-game losing streak. Demons head coach Shannon Rugg tells KCII Sports that, over the last week, his star players started to play like it once more.

“Adalyn Long the last two games has shot the ball extremely well this week,” Rugg says. “Super proud of her. Alex Murphy inside had a couple of good games for us. Leighton Messinger, over at Ottumwa [last Monday] did an excellent job. I believe she had a double-double. So we’ve got some things figured out.”

But, while freshmen like Long and Messinger have given Washington a spark this season, Mid-Prairie has leaned on veteran leaders to reach a mark of 13-5. Seniors Amara Jones and Landry Pacha lead the Golden Hawks in scoring, while Pacha’s nearly eight rebounds per game help end possessions for a defense that allows only 42 points per game. But Hawks head coach Danny Hershberger says his team still needs to value their own possessions just as much.

“We’ve got to do a good job of taking care of the basketball,” Hershberger says. “When we do that, and when we limit our turnovers, we continue to give ourselves as many opportunities on the offensive end as we can.”

In the boys’ game, Washington comes in at 7-7 and is looking for momentum to close out the regular season. Behind the scoring firepower of senior guard Ethan Patterson, the Demons have at least avoided any losing streaks, only dropping back-to-back games once this season. But, after falling Friday at Burlington, head coach Collin Stark says it’ll be tough to avoid another loss against Mid-Prairie.

“They’ve got a couple shooters, a couple scorers,” Stark says. “We’ll see if we can make it difficult on them and hopefully get back to playing our style of basketball.”

The Golden Hawks are 10-7 but can score with the best of them thanks to the shooting of seniors Camron Pickard and Alex Bean. Head coach Daren Lambert also likes where his team is at with their effort and their mentality.

“The biggest thing I’m taking away from this week is that I think we’re bringing toughness,” Lambert says. “We’re bringing the attitude and the relentless effort that we kind of lacked there in the middle of the season.”

The boys’ teams did not meet last year. We’ll have both games of the doubleheader as the Washington Demons meet the Mid-Prairie Golden Hawks this evening on 106.1 FM, 102.5 FM and AM 1380 KCII, as well as streaming on KCIIradio.com. Coverage begins with the Washington HyVee Pregame Show live from Tim Grady Gymnasium at 5:30.