Staff photo / Brian Yauger Western Reserve forward Kylah Busch drives to the basket past multiple Jackson-Milton defenders during Thursday’s game.

BERLIN CENTER — Before Thursday’s game, the Western Reserve Blue Devils wore shirts saying “U Bring the Smoke, We’ll Bring the Fire.”

Inspired by a playful offseason exchange between Blue Devils coach Steve Miller and one of Jackson-Milton’s players, the rival teams were both eager to make a statement.

In the second meeting between the Devils and Jays, fire beat smoke, and Western Reserve took down Jackson-Milton, 68-46.

“I went to the Dairy Queen during volleyball season, and (one of their players) waited on me,” Miller said. “We had some small talk. ‘How’d the summer go? How’s the new coach?’ And she said, ‘We’ve taken our lumps for two years. … We’re bringing the smoke this year.’ So I said, ‘Well, you can bring the smoke, but we’re bringing the fire.’

“That was just a little something for us and them and for our girls to have fun with. It’s a nice rivalry game, and to add a little bit to the game, we just figured, let’s make some shirts, and let’s try to come out with a little bit of fire tonight.”

The Blue Devils came out with fire, starting on a 10-0 run. Things teetered as the game went on and the Blue Jays found their shot, but Western Reserve maintained a solid cushion throughout.

“I thought we allowed Jackson-Milton to get back in it, because we got a little bit lackadaisical with our fundamentals, and they got a couple second-chance shots and allowed them to get around us a couple times and get right back in the game,” Miller said. “I thought Jackson-Milton did a great job of being physical tonight, being intense. They never went away. I mean, we had them down over 20 multiple times, and they just kept fighting back to get it back down. Hats off to them.”

Kylee Ramsey led the Blue Devils with 20 points. Quincy Miller and Giana Leone followed her up with 18 and 13 points, respectively.

Junior Amani Yasin paced Jackson-Milton with 17 points. Prentiss Fishtorn tacked on 11.

The Blue Jays fall to 9-4 on the season and are now 7-3 in Mahoning Valley Athletic Conference play. While a young team, first-year coach Dan Turner is pleased with their progress and knows that his group is only going to get better.

Nerves got the better of Jackson-Milton early, however, and by the time they recovered, the deficit was too big to close.

“I think the girls were a little nervous; that’s why they went out on that run in the beginning,” Turner said. “Tried to settle them down, but we got a young team, so we’re trying to get them settled in. The good thing about it is, I have all the girls coming back next year, besides one. We’re going to keep using all these games this year as a building block. Right now, we’re ahead of schedule. Last year, we had nine wins. We’re right at nine now. It’s one game at a time. We lost this one. We’ve got another one on Monday against Waterloo. It’s another chance to get better. We’re gonna look at the film tomorrow, and see where we can get better.”

The Blue Devils (11-1, 10-0 MVAC-Scarlet) swept the season series against their rivals.

With the tournament fast approaching, Western Reserve is keying in on the little things as they aim for another district title.

“I think it’s just attention to detail, something that I always try to get my teams to do,” Miller said. “I feel that this group on a nightly basis and at practice, comes out and plays pretty hard. The attention to detail is the scouting report, knowing assignments, being accountable for what you need to do on offensive plays, defensive assignments, press, breaker, all those things.

“I don’t think we’re good enough and skilled enough to go as deep as we want to, unless we do it mentally. We have enough talent physically, but once you get deep into the tournament run, everybody does, so it’s all the little things. Paying attention to detail is what we need to do for the next month.”

The Blue Devils have a big test on Saturday, playing host to Girard.