By AARON MANAGHAN

Sports editor

While an 11-point difference doesn’t qualify as a blowout in and of itself, the Olympic Trojans girls basketball team outplayed Sequim on the court on Friday in a much bigger way.

While the Trojans won 55-44, the lead could have been much larger had it not been for missed lay-ups.

That just shows how strong the Trojans (9-4 overall, 8-2 in Olympic League play) are becoming as the team’s youngsters start feeling more confident in their roles, Oly coach Rick Peters said.

“We’re a very good fundamental basketball team that has some young key players stepping up,” Peters said.

While the team’s starting sophomores Sammy Viray and Samantha Thornton certainly played key roles again on Friday, it was senior Nicole Buhl who once again led the way for Olympic, just missing a triple-double with 18 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists.

The timing was great as well, as the Trojans remained without inside presence Shawntell Bradford, who hopes to return soon from a severe ankle sprain.

While Peters said he definitely prefers to see Bradford on the court, a silver lining to her injury has presented itself in the development of Thornton, who Peters had been trying to get more minutes, including at JV.

“If there is a positive, it’s that Sam wouldn’t have gotten as much experience as she has,” he said.

Thornton scored nine for Oly while Serah Peterson added 12. Peterson said it was nice to get revenge against Sequim, which beat Oly 51-49 in December.

“We really wanted to win,” Peterson, who scored two well-timed fourth-quarter buckets to help quash any hopes of a Sequim resurgence, said. “We wanted to stay undefeated at home.”

After the Trojans built a 22-14 first-quarter lead, they were able to expand it to 38-26 at the half. Sequim battled back however behind a tough man-to-man defense that Peters said he wishes his team could see more often.

“I personally think they played great man defense on us,” Peters said. “It was tough. I wish more teams did that because we don’t see that enough (before the playoffs). We’ve got to try to recreate that environment in practice.”

That defense helped Sequim outscore Oly 11-6 in the third quarter before the Trojans put the game out of reach in the fourth.

Olympic battled Port Angeles Tuesday but results were unavailable at press time. The winner of that contest took sole possession of first place in the league standings.