Ladies’ shooting, rebounds lead to 59-49 loss

Trigg 59, Crittenden 49

Jan. 5

Crittenden 9 19 32 49

Trigg 9 22 34 59

Crittenden - Hodge 21, Johnson 10, Courtney 4, Tabor 9, Brantley 2, Brown 3, Franklin, Graham. FG. 19. 3-pointers 2 (Tabor, Brown). FT. 5-12. Fouls 17.

Trigg - Matlock 24, Kearney 8, Want 8, Maxey 6, Futrell 6, Grubbs 4, Parker 3, Wortham. FG. 20. 3-pointers 3 (Maxey, Kearney 2). FT. 10-18. Fouls 16.

A sluggish defensive performance coupled with surrendering 19 offensive rebounds brought the Lady Rockets unbeaten streak in Fifth District play to an end Tuesday night at Cadiz as they fell to Trigg County 59-49.

In a first half that featured three ties and numerous lead changes, the Lady Wildcats managed to take a 22-19 lead into intermission.

After holding Trigg center Ashley Matlock to 12 points in last month’s 71-52 victory at Rocket Arena, she had a heyday in Tuesday’s rematch.

She poured in 24 points, grabbed 12 rebounds and recorded three steals as the hosts prevented Crittenden (4-6, 3-1) from claiming a stranglehold on the top seed for the postseason tournament.

Trailing 22-17 with less than :05 ticks left in the first half, Lady Rocket forward Whitney Johnson (10 points, 10 rebounds) scored right before the buzzer to bring her team even closer in a seesaw second quarter. She also scored her team’s first six points of the second half as they claimed a 25-22 lead less than 2:00 into the third quarter.

At that juncture it appeared the visitors may have weathered the storm against the pesky Lady Wildcats and were ready to get things rolling.

But Trigg had other ideas as they ran off seven unanswered points to claim a 29-25 advantage and would never trail again during the remainder of the contest.

The Lady Rockets’ low post defense struggled most of the way as Trigg had their way in the paint all night long.

While the rebounding statistic ended deadlocked at 45-all, it was 19 Lady Wildcat offensive rebounds and 12 second chance points that helped them get revenge for the earlier season setback.

Points off the bench were also a big key in their win as they outscored Crittenden 12-3 in that area.

Crittenden shot 21-of-62 from the floor for an icy 33.8 percent as no player shot over over 40 percent. While the hosts were not a lot better for the game, going 23-of-61 for 37.7 percent, they shot much better in the second half going 15-for-30.

After the lackluster performance, Lady Rocket coach Shannon Hodge lamented that her squad has yet to put a consistent 32:00 of solid basketball together this season.

“We somehow run out of legs,” she said, also pointing to a lack of conditioning.

Despite her team defeating the Lady Wildcats by 19 last month, the Lady Rocket skipper did not believe her team would have an easy time in the rematch.

“I don’t think you ever go to Trigg County and think it is gonna be easy. I thought they played well,” said Hodge.

Another frustrating thing to her was that with a pair of district wins this week, the Lady Rockets could have been in the driver’s seat for a number one seed for the Fifth District Tournament.

While that is still attainable, Hodge believes Tuesday’s loss makes the district race more interesting.

“The district is very competitive. You can’t count any game before you play it,” she said.