Hartsville Girls come up short for Region Championship
By Don Gearhart
With the Region 6 championship and No. 1 seed on the line, the Hartsville Lady Red Foxes invaded the raucous house of the Tigers to face Wilson. Both teams entered the contest with identical 8-1 Region records.
Things did not go well for Hartsville as Wilson opened an 11-0 lead to start the game before Tatiana Fisher finally found points for the Lady Red Foxes when she grabbed an offensive rebound and banked it off the glass for two points after five minutes of scoreless activity. Thanks to a great pass to Brooke Mitchell earned another two points, Jaz Reyes scored to make it `11-6 in favor of Wilson. Mitchell drained a 3-pointer from the corner to close the first period with the Lady Tigers clinging to an 11-9 lead.
Mitchell carried the team on her back in the second period. She drained two more long-range shots and scored two baskets inside the paint to score all 10 of Hartsville’s points. It was not enough, though, as Willson added to their lead and took a 23-19 advantage to the locker room.
Hartsville reduced the four-point deficit to only a point at 37-36 at the end of three periods and even tied the game for the first time at 35-35 with a minute to go in the stanza. Jazzy Frierson, who had been quiet to this point in the game, hit for seven points and Mitchell contributed four points in the effort.
Hartsville tied the score once more with 3:35 left to play in the game when Mitchell’s fourth 3-pointer knotted the score at 43-43. After going down by two points, Mitchell once again drained a trifecta to give the Lady Red Foxes their only lead of the night at 46-45. With just two minutes to play, Wilson was able to find easy baskets on offensive rebounds to outscore Hartsville down the stretch by a 6-2 margin and a 51-48 victory.
Free throws were the telling tale of the game as Hartsville managed to outscore Wilson by nine points from the floor but were outscored by 12 points at the free throw line. Hartsville only took eight charity shots the entire game, hitting on three of those. On the other hand, Wilson made good on 15-21. The disparity was fairly obvious as the bigger and stronger Lady Tigers bullied their way around the boards causing the Hartsville quintet to be subject to fouls. Wilson took advantage of that aggressiveness when Hartsville had the ball, but, the officials were letting a lot of pushing and shoving to go on without a whistle. However, it was the turnovers that really cost the Lady Red Foxes with numerous poor passes that were gobbled up by the Lady Tigers to thwart any offensive momentum for Hartsville.
Mitchell was a standout for Hartsville. She scored 25 points (more than half of the team) and totalled five 3-point shots along the way. Logan Murray (17 points) and Ariana Johnson (14 points) led the Lady Tigers.
