EDGARD — The winner of this week’s quarterfinal between West St. John High and KIPP Booker T. Washington will likely take home the state championship come March, according to Lady Rams coach Lester Smith.

Smith thinks West St. John has a fair shot of advancing through what is sure to be a good game at 6 p.m. Thursday, when the Lady Rams take on Booker T. Washington on the Lady Lions’ home court in New Orleans.

It will be a shot for redemption from last month’s 27-63 loss against the team, which Smith said stood out as one of West St. John’s weakest shooting games of the season.

“We’re going in with the intention of winning the game,” Smith said. “We’re not going to lay down and die. It’s going to be a challenging game. Last time, it kind of got out of hand once we started taking bad shots. We’ve just go to be a little more disciplined.”

Smith said the Lady Rams can pull out a win if they play as they did Monday night, when they won 42-39 against Grand Lake in the regional round of the playoffs.

Grand Lake was a disciplined team, armed with talent from senior Kailey Murrell, who put up 29 points in the bi-district playoff round.  WSJH contained Murrell during a game with rapid scoring on both sides.

Stevante Hamilton led in scoring with 18 points for West St. John, followed by Nazel Breaux with 11 points and Kylie Adams with 10 points.

West St. John was down by 10 points in the third quarter before bouncing back to take the lead and, eventually, the victory.