Facing the top-ranked team in Class 4A, according to the Texas Association of Basketball Coaches, the Brownwood Lady Lions started their District 6-4A slate with a 56-22 loss to the Glen Rose Lady Tigers Friday night at Warren Gym.
“We knew going into the game with them being the No. 1 team in 4A that it was going to be a tough task,” said Lady Lions 14th-year head coach Heather Hohertz. “I thought my kids played with a ton of energy and effort for four quarters, Glen Rose is just a really good ball club. We turned the ball over too many times and I told the girls they didn’t need us to help them score, they could do that themselves. We also didn’t shoot the ball well at all, but that’s also a credit to Glen Rose’s defense. But the kids played really hard and competed and that’s all I can ask, not to come in here with their heads down and already defeated.”
Trailing 5-3 with 5:43 left in the opening quarter, the Lady Lions (13-15, 0-1) did not score again in the first period as Glen Rose (27-1, 1-0) raced out to a 19-3 lead by the end of the frame. Brownwood’s scoring drought reached 8:07 before a bucket trimmed the Lady Tigers’ lead to 22-5 with 5:36 left in the first half, but at that point the hill was too steep for the Lady Lions to climb.
Brownwood trailed 40-13 at halftime, and was down 44-17 with 4:58 left in third period. But again, the Lady Lions suffered from a lengthy scoring drought – a span of 8:06 between points – as Glen Rose boosted its lead to 54-19 with 4:52 left in the contest.
Glen Rose was paced by Alexis Rynders with 20 points, 6-4 junior post Aimee Flippen with 14, Grace Booth and Lily Melton with eight apiece, and Jewell Morris, Brooklynn Peterson and Samantha Ellenberger with two points each.
Icess Hall led the Lady Lions with nine points on a trio of three-pointers followed by Mady Pyle with six, Sidney Windham with five, and Hannah Dean with two points.
“Icess handled the ball really well going against their pressure and made some shots, and Sid played to the best of her ability guarding Flippen,” Hohertz said. “Sid’s undersized, Flippen is a lot bigger than she is but she gave tremendous effort trying to contest shots and she did a good job crashing the boards offensively and defensively.”
The Lady Lions converted 21 percent (7 of 34) of their field goal attempts, including 22 percent (5 of 22) of their three-pointers, and sank 75 percent (3 of 4) of their free throws. Brownwood also committed 24 turnovers, tallied 16 rebounds, and added five steals and five assists.
“I want to give a shout out to the crowd, no matter what they stayed in it, and the cheerleaders were very loud,” Hohertz said. “That helped the girls continue to play hard for four quarters by feeding off their energy.”
The Lady Lions resume their District 6-4A slate at 6:15 p.m. Tuesday when they visit Mineral Wells.
“Mineral Wells plays really hard and they’ve played a couple of common opponents that we’ve played,” Hohertz said. “We’re just going to have to be able to bounce back and handle the travel. We haven’t traveled in a while so we have to be ready to get off the bus and go play. It’s a big game for us, and we need to steal some games on the road and take care of the ones at home that we need to take care of.”
