MEDORA
It was a tale of two halves at Medora High School on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
The Hornets looked for revenge in a rematch against Crothersville. On Dec. 9, the Tigers held their home floor as they repelled the Hornets 54-17.
Despite a slight 18-14 lead at half, the Hornets couldn’t hang on as they fell 46-34 in the Hornets Nest.
The Tigers took an 8-6 lead after the first eight minutes of play. However, the Tigers had seven fouls and had to take most of their starters out during the second quarter.
At the 7:01 mark in the second quarter, the Hornets took their first lead at 10-8 on two free throws from point guard Jadelyn Dean.
With 4:32 remaining in the half, the Tigers tallied 10 fouls. Dean sunk one of two shots from the charity stripe and would go on to make five of six free throws down the stretch as the Hornets took a 18-14 lead at halftime.
“I don’t know what’s going on with our team right now; it seems like we’ve almost been on a roller coaster,” Tigers coach Kevin Hensley said. “We’re on the downhill right now, and we need to climb back up that hill. We had to go deep in our bench to save us from some foul trouble in the second half.”
Following halftime, the Tigers came out on fire.
Crothersville started on a 7-0 run by creating a number of turnovers with its full-court defense.
“We switched up to that diamond defense, and they didn’t seem to know how to really deal with it,” Hensley said. “Brad (McCammon) was able to get his girls to get the ball into the middle, and they got the ball a few times up the court. I think that really turned the tide of the game.”
In the third quarter, the Hornets found themselves in foul trouble with eight whistled against them.
Without the injured Carley McCammon, the Hornets’ leading scorer, and Breanna Pfeiffer, the Hornets had to rely on the bench play of Lillian Hatfiled, Marsadeez Phillips, Elexus Morris and Kiana Thompson.
“The bench really came in and contributed,” Hornets coach Brad McCammon said. “I’m really proud of the kids. They came out and played hard. It shows we’ve improved and are doing the things we need to do. They gave me everything they had.”
The Tigers’ Katrina Christian notched 10 of her team’s 21 points in the third quarter, as they led the Hornets 35-27 heading into the fourth quarter.
“They had to get aggressive or we would have let (Medora) hang around,” Hensley said. “We have a bad habit of playing to the level of our competition.”
Kashmir Kelshaw opened the third quarter with a 3-pointer, and the Tigers led the rest of the way as they moved to 12-6 on the season.
Christian led the Tigers with 17 points and 12 rebounds, and Dean finished the high-scorer for the Hornets with 13.
At the end of the night, the Hornets had 15 fouls to the Tigers’ 24.
“One thing we talked about after the game was what the score was there and what here,” McCammon said. “I can’t ask anymore than the effort they showed out there. They showed guts. If we keep playing with that intensity anything is possible.”
The Hornets (5-14) will host Shoals on Thursday, and the Tigers have Austin coming to town tonight.