Lady Lions show progress in final district games
By Sam Waller
The Albany Lady Lions continued their run of strong play last week, defeating Abilene TLCA before running into a buzzsaw at Cisco.
The Lady Lions (5-19 overall, 2-9 District 10-2A) closed out the season Tuesday, Feb. 4 with a 52-32 loss against Anson. Details will be reported next week.
Caroline Holson, the team’s lone senior, was ill and unable to attend senior recognition night.
“It’s sad because I don’t want to be done with her,” first year Lady Lions head coach Ashlyn Bevel said. “She’s done well for me.”
After showing marked improvement in losses the week before to Stamford and Haskell, both of which have qualified for the playoffs, Albany continued the trend with 40-16 victory Tuesday, Jan. 28 over TLCA. From the first half of the district schedule, the Lady Lions improved by 33 points against Stamford and 18 against Haskell. The win over TLCA was by seven more points than the first meeting.
“Coming in, I felt like we should beat them because we beat them in the first round,” Bevel said. “I told the girls to not let up. They played so well against Haskell and Stamford, don’t stop down to another team’s level. Continue that hard work and hard play, and that’s what they did. The momentum of the game did not change.”
But victory didn’t come easy. TLCA took a 10-7 lead in the first quarter. Albany responded with a 14-0 run in the second. Albany allowed just one point over the middle two quarters in opening up a 19-point lead.
Holson finished with 15 points to lead the Lady Lions and Tatum Grady scored nine.
At Cisco, the sixth-ranked Lady Loboes lived up to their billing, leading 22-5 in the first quarter. That was still an improvement for Albany from the first meeting.
“I was very proud of the girls because last time against Cisco, it was 34-1 in the first quarter, Bevel said. “Cisco’s good. They’ve got 10 solid players.”
While the Lady Lions were able to get looks at the basket, finishing was an issue. Madi Parrott, the only Albany player with one basket, finished with seven points.
“We were breaking Cisco’s press; we just weren’t making shots,” Bevel said. “We played hard and stayed after it. Our goal was to keep them to 20 points a quarter, and we pretty much met that.”
ALBANY 40 – TLCA 16
ALBANY 7 14 9 10 - 40 TLCA 10 0 1 5 - 16
ALBANY – Caroline Holson 15, Tatum Grady 9, Ashlyn Miller 6, Madi Parrott 5, Charlee Hefner 3, Charley Flowers 2.
ALBANY 15 – CISCO 67
ALBANY 5 3 2 5 - 15 CISCO 22 18 15 12 - 67
ALBANY – Madi Parrott 7, Charlee Hefner 3, Caroline Holson 2, Tatum Grady 2, Ashlyn Miller 1.
