Paragould holds off Lady Pats

Paragould holds off Lady Pats

Marion to grabs late lead but it wasn’t enough to overtake the Rams in the final seconds

sports@theeveningtimes.com The Marion Lady Patriots dug themselves out of a 14-point second-half whole and held a fourth-quarter lead against Paragould, but the valiant effort fell by the waste side as Marion failed to get off a lastsecond three-pointer as the buzzer sounded on a 50-47 Paragould victory.

The loss wasn’t for a lack of opportunities, as Marion had a chance to knock down a gametying shot. Paragould center Kalyssa Hollis connected from the low-post and drew contact with 19 seconds left, but missed a free throw leading to two Lady Patriots shots, both of which failed to find the basket.

Forced to foul, Marion sent Paragould’s sophomore point guard Alex Brengard to the line with a chance to ice the victory for the Rams. Brengard failed to convert on either shot though, leading to a Marion rebound and Lady Patriots timeout with under seven seconds to play. Marion head coach Shunda Johnson drew up a play. Marion guard Angel Davie, who had sank three threepointers in the contest, dribbled to the Ram’s arc but failed to get off a shot as the score went final.

“I wanted her to take that lastsecond shot,” Johnson said. “We wanted Morgan (Christian) to set her a screen, but Angel picked her dribble up. She got down and she did a spin out. She had her head down and did a spin out instead of just pulling up on a three-pointer.”

That Marion was even in position to send the game into overtime showed great resolve from the team. The Marion girls got off to a slow start, only sinking 1-of-14 field goals in the first quarter as Paragould jetted out to a 13-2 lead after the opening stanza. The second frame didn’t go much better for the Lady Patriots, with Marion heading into the locker rooms at halftime down 25-11 and only making 3-of-11 shots in the second quarter.

Not making life any easier for Marion in that first half was a trio of Paragould skyscrapers; junior Zoey Beasley (6-foot-2), junior Kalyssa Hoolis (6foot-1) and sophomore Taylor Beasley (6-foot-1). The trio combined for exactly half of Paragould’s 50 total points.

“I wish we could have three, four or five girls that tall,” Johnson said. “They just grow them big in that area, I suppose, and they did a good job of finishing around the basket. We were there. They were just scoring on top of us.”

Down 14 points at the break, Johnson and the Lady Patriots unfortunately found themselves in familiar territory, something the head coach had spoken with her team about just a day prior.

“They just jumped on us early,” Johnson said. “We just dug ourselves into a whole, and we talked about that last night. We try not to get ourselves in such a deep whole that we have to play so hard just to dig ourselves out of it.” But, dig themselves out of it they did. Upon taking the court for the third frame, Marion picked up the defensive pressure, causing seven third-quarter Paragould turnovers which the Lady Patriots used to trim the Rams’ lead to a mere 41-37 advantage heading into the final frame.

“They locked in and played defense today,” Johnson said. “We actually rotated correctly. That’s probably the best defense we’ve played all season, expect for the first game of the year.”

Marion sophomore Kaia Williams opened up the fourth by sinking a three-pointer from the left corner arc and pulling Marion within a point of the Rams, and Davie came up with a steal less than a minute later which she converted into a layup to give the Lady Patriots their first lead, 44-43, of the game at the 6:03 mark of the final stanza.

Back down by a pair of point, 48-46, Marion senior guard Ashely Harney swiped an errant Paragould pass and got sent to the charity stripe with 41.5 seconds remaining. Harney, however, only sank one of the free throws, leaving the Lady Patriots trailing by a point.

Johnson says it was the team’s cumulative 9-of-19 night from the line that was the biggest blow to her team.

“Just missed free throws, not saying it was Ashley’s missed free throw,” Johnson said. “We had plenty of missed free throws prior to that. So, we just go to go back to the gym and get back to trying to make free throws and talking about scenarios, like that last second three-pointer we needed by Angel. We got to work on some of those scenarios in practice.”

The Lady Patriots look to get back on track tonight as Marion host the Wynne Yellowjackets (0-18) in a 6:00 p.m. tip-off.

By Collins Peeples