Either the Redmond or Summit girls’ basketball teams were going to start with a marquee win on the opening night of Intermountain Conference play Jan. 23.

The two early-season conference favorites came in with a combined 20 wins on the season. The Panthers, last year’s IMC champs and semifinalist at the state tournament, were ranked No. 5 in the OSAA rankings and the upstart Storm were ranked No. 6.

The Panthers took a massive step in defending its title with a 53-40 win over perhaps their greatest challenger in the conference. Dating back to last season, it is the 11th straight IMC win for Redmond.

“We practice and train for these situations,” said senior guard Azlynn Ure. “I think we were prepared for this one.”

Senior guard Dylan Cheney led the Panthers (10-5, 1-0 IMC) with 14 points. Junior guard Mylaena Norton scored 11, Azlynn Ure added nine points, while sophomore center Freya Snow finished with eight points. The Storm (11-5, 0-1) were led by junior Kalyn Christ’s 14 points while senior Kalia Durfee and sophomore Rou Coates-Flaherty each finished with six points.

It took until the second half for both teams to get rolling offensively in the defensive battle.

Perhaps it was the nerves of playing in a marquee conference matchup between top teams, or maybe both high-level teams were locked in defensively. One also cannot rule out the possibility of an invisible forcefield around the rim that led to the rough start for both teams’ offenses.

It took the Storm nearly nearly 12 minutes into the game to score from the field. The first seven points (and all five first quarter points) for Summit came at the free throw line. The Panthers, who also struggled from the field, had their chances to pull away early but missed eight free throws in the first half.

“When you play good teams this is what happens,” said Redmond coach Alex Carlson. “We talk about it all the time, defense travels. We were really guarding and that kept us in it.”

When the dust settled after the first 16 minutes, Redmond took an 18-15 lead into halftime. Both squads felt good in their locker rooms about the prospects of coming away with a win in the second half.

“We just knew we could win it,” said Redmond guard Dylan Cheney, who finished with a team-high 14 points. “We knew that we had to play better in the second half for us to come out with the win.”

Said Summit coach Austin Crook: “I told the girls that if we can shoot as poorly as we did in the first half and feel like we can play with a team as good as Redmond, then we are doing a lot of things right.”

In the second half, it was the reigning IMC champs who had been tested against the state’s top teams during the non-league season that rose to the moment in the second half.

“We talk about it all the time, playing in those games was just preparing to play in games like this,” said Ure, who finished with nine points. “I think those games in the pre-season really helped us tonight.”

Approaching the midway point of the third quarter, it was a 22-19 game. But with the Storm offense still having a hard time making baskets in their half-court offense, Crook believed that his team needed to switch from playing a man-to-man defense to a trapping defense in an effort to force turnovers and score in transition.

But there was a risk involved in that strategy, mainly leaving Cheney, who has been on a heater the past couple of weeks from the outside open.

“She punished us,” Crook said. “That was really the difference in that second half.”

Cheney’s 3-pointer from the winger turned a three-point game into a six-point Panther lead. With 2:30 remaining in the third quarter, Cheney, from nearly the same spot, knocked down another 3 to extend the Panther lead to 30-21.

Three minutes into the fourth quarter, Cheney, who set the program record with eight made 3s in Redmond’s win over La Grade on Saturday, delivered the knockout blow with her third 3 of the second half to

“It felt so good,” Cheney said. “I knew early on they were going to try and cut off my shot. In the second half, I got a little more actions to shoot. So I just let it fly.”

Both teams will be back on the court on Monday. The Storm will host Bend High while the Panthers will take on Ridgeview. Both games start at 7 p.m.