Even though the Joliet Central offense didn’t run as smoothly as the Steelmen would have liked Tuesday night, the defense more than took over and helped carry Central to a 59-30 win over crosstown and Southwest Prairie Conference rival Joliet West.

The Steelmen (12-10, 6-2) featured a balanced scoring attack all night. Elliana Fowler and Malasia Chandler each scored 12 points, Elena Moody scored 10, and Taneisha Robinson and Neveah Wright added eight each.

A good number of those points came from the tight, aggressive Steelmen defense. Central harassed the Tigers (3-17, 1-7) into 28 turnovers, many of which turned into fast-break baskets for Central.

“We work very well together on defense,” Moody said. “The defense helps our offense. After we score, we want to hurry up and get back on defense so we can try to take the ball away again and get an easy basket.

“Everyone has confidence in each other. [Guards] Naveah and Elliana are great passers as well as scorers, so we all know if we get open that one of them will get us the ball. It doesn’t matter to us who scores, as long as somebody does.”

The Tigers, who lost to the Steelmen last Thursday, stormed out of the gate quickly, getting putback baskets from Ande Carlson and Maya Zanzola to grab a 4-0 lead. Central countered with an 8-1 run, getting a pair of baskets from Moody and one each by Wright and Chandler, to take an 8-5 advantage.

Joliet West got back-to-back baskets by Zanzola for a 9-8 lead, but it was the last time the Tigers had the lead. Central got a basket from Fowler and a pair of free throws from Chandler to take a 12-9 advantage. West’s Temperance Jackson scored to pull her team to within 12-11, but Central ended the quarter on a 9-0 run, highlighted by a 3-pointer from Alexis Pedrosa, to lead 21-11 entering the second.

West got the lead down to 24-17 midway through the second quarter, but the Central defense did not allow the Tigers to score the rest of the half. Meanwhile, Fowler kicked off a 12-0 run with a fast-break basket, then a 3-pointer, and Robinson finished it with back-to-back baskets, sending the Steelmen into halftime with a 36-17 edge.

“It wasn’t our offense tonight,” Central coach Laura Brumfiel said. “We really didn’t run our offense well or shoot well, but our defense was unreal. Our goal was to get every 50/50 ball and rebound well, and we did both of those things.

“We were very balanced offensively, and we’d love to do that every night. If we get everyone scoring, along with playing that kind of defense, we can be very tough. Our girls play so hard, and they have respect for the game, for the school and for each other. It’s much easier to play hard for people you respect. We want to put ourselves in the best position we can for the postseason.”

The Steelmen defense showed itself in full force after halftime, as it limited the Tigers to just four points in the third quarter. Central scored the first 14 points of the second half, including a stretch of six straight points from Wright. The Steelmen led 56-21 entering the fourth, invoking the running clock for the fourth.

Jada Thompson scored six of her team-high 10 points in the fourth quarter for West. Zanzola and Carlson finished with six points each, while Thompson had a game-high nine rebounds.

“We want to take the wisdom we got from this game and apply it to the next one,” West coach Breanna Blackmon said. “We came out with a lot of energy and played well early, but we turned it over too much. Shout out to Central for playing very tough defense tonight.

“This year for us, ‘W’ and ‘L’ doesn’t stand for wins and losses, but wisdom and lessons. As long as we gain some wisdom and learn lessons, then we are moving forward. There’s still a lot of basketball to be played, and we will keep getting better.”