Staff photo / Dan Hiner Columbiana’s Annah Clemmer tries to drive during the second quarter of Thursday’s game at Columbiana High School.

COLUMBIANA — Things couldn’t have started any better for the Columbiana girls basketball team on Thursday night.

The Clippers scored the first 16 points of the game and held Bellaire without a field goal for the entire first quarter.

That was more than enough to result in a 45-22 win for the Clippers at Columbiana High School.

“Came out and decided to do what we do, and we do play pretty good defense. We established that early,” Columbiana head coach Dave Crismon said. “We made some shots early, and that’s always nice because (the Columbiana players) get comfortable.”

Annah Clemmer was the go-to girl for the Clippers (17-4) early. She scored 11 of the team’s 16 first-quarter points.

The Big Reds didn’t get on the board until Aubree Hines split a pair of free throws with just over half a second to play in the first.

Columbiana’s defense carried into the second as it held Bellaire (11-9) to three points until Kayla Edgar doubled the Big Reds’ total with a 3-pointer at the 2:02 mark.

“We always try and come out strong, some games better than others,” Clemmer said. “It just felt like there was a fire under us. Once we get going, it’s easier to keep going.”

Clemmer tallied 18 points in the first half as the Clippers took a 26-6 lead into halftime. It was another solid showing for the junior who also registered a few blocks on the defensive end of the court.

“That’s been Annah the past five or six games. She’s really been locked in,” Crismon said. “I think she realizes that it’s crunch time now.”

The Big Reds never threatened the Clippers in the second half, and Crismon had an opportunity to get some younger players some minutes down the stretch.

Clemmer finished with a game-high 25 points, Evelyn Rapp added 11 and Megan Moser finished with seven.

Kayla Edgar led the Big Reds with nine points. Bellaire’s leading scorer, Tamya Morgan, came in averaging over 14 points per game, but Clemmer kept her off the scoresheet.

Columbiana was rolling until just recently. The Clippers had a nine-game winning streak snapped with back-to-back losses to non-conference opponents.

They fell 48-35 to Western Reserve on Saturday and 72-56 to Wheeling Central Catholic (W. Va.) on Tuesday.

They have one more game in the regular season, a meeting in Salineville with undefeated Southern on Wednesday. The Clippers fell to Southern 39-23 on Dec. 18.

Columbiana has relied on its defense all year, and Clemmer said Wednesday’s game will come down to the team’s ability to defend a talented Indians.

That will be key if the Clippers want to shut down Southern’s standout freshman, Katie Kellogg, who has registered a quadruple-double, a 43-point game and owns the program single-game records for steals (17) and assists (13) over the course of her rookie campaign.

“A lot of respect, first of all, for (Southern head coach Michael Skrinjar) and what he’s done down there, and they do have one of the premier guards in our area as a freshman. She’s very, very talented,” Crismon said. “But we just wanna go compete. We wanna go compete, play hard and see what happens.”