No matter the amount of wins and losses or what the scoreboard says at the end of the game, no one can doubt the amount of effort put forth by the Tooele girls basketball team.

Even with Payson scoring the first 16 points of the game on their home court Tuesday night, Tooele never let up. They couldn’t climb back enough to make it close, however, as the Lions walloped the Buffaloes 74-29 in Payson.

Sharon Lyman led the Buffaloes with six points followed by Becca Smaellie and Tashina Hathaway with five points each. It wasn’t enough to overcome the 27 points from Payson’s Brooke Hiatt.

“They gave everything they had out there today,” said Tooele head coach Karie Frederickson. “Sometimes I have to remind myself how young and inexperienced they are and just be as encouraging as possible.”

Payson jumped on Tooele early with their stifling defense as the Lions jumped out to a 16-0 lead to start the game. Hiatt with seven points and Morgan Bateman with six fueled the early spurt.

Lyman made Tooele’s first basket with just over three minutes left in the first quarter as the Buffaloes found themselves down 22-5 after the first period.

Things looked up for the Buffs in the beginning of the second quarter. Smaellie started a run all by herself, scoring five consecutive points, in a 9-0 Tooele run to start the quarter to bring the game to 22-14.

After being reprimanded by their coach, Payson came out of a time-out and scored the following 12 points in the quarter to build their lead back up to 34-14. Lyman scored four points in the quarter as the Buffaloes trailed 40-18 at the half.

The scoring continued for Payson as they came out of the locker room scoring the first 12 points in the quarter for a 52-18 lead. Tooele used a balanced scoring attack in the third with three players with two points. Kelcey Stephenson, Kylee Harris and Loretta Beaty each scored two points in the quarter as a result of their hard work. Payson however, sat with a comfortable 59-25 lead heading into the final quarter.

No miraculous comeback was in the cards for the Buffs as they only managed to score four points in the period with two each from Hillary Anderson and Stephenson. Payson held on to earn their first win in Region 7 play.

In their first game since Dec. 19, Tooele had a tough time over the holidays getting all their players to show up for practice. “We never had a full team over the holidays and that hurt us in our practices,” Frederickson said. “And we played exactly like we practiced.”

Tooele will next play at Orem tonight at 7 p.m.

Jake Gordon: jgordon@tooeletranscript.com