Lady Dev Is beat Lady Eagles

Lady Dev Is beat Lady Eagles

Second-half domination lead West Memphis girls to victory

By Billy Woods

WM School District PARAGOULD – It wasn’t quite as miraculous as their victory here last year, but the West Memphis Lady Devils seemingly rose from the dead here Tuesday night to record a 49-43 victory over Greene County Tech.

Last year, sophomore Aryah Hazley torched Tech with a career-high 42 points to lead the West Memphis girls back from a 10-point deficit after three quarters for a 72-67 overtime win.

On Tuesday night, the Lady Devils fought back from an 11-point hole late in the second quarter before dominating the Lady Eagles in the second half.

“We regained our composure in the second half,” said Lady Devil head coach Sonja Tate. “We just executed offensive plays and played great on defense.”

Tate ordered her club into a 2-3 zone defense in the second half and after making four three-pointers in the first half, the Lady Eagles converted only 8 of 21 shots from the field in the final two quarters.

Furthermore, the Lady Devil defense forced seven Tech turnovers in the third quarter and 11 for the second half after the hosts turned it over just four times in the first half.

“We have been practicing a lot on trapping lately,” said Tate. “We tried to do it in the first half. We just didn’t execute it. We did in the second half.”

Hazley didn’t enjoy the outing she did a year ago at Tech, but on Tuesday night she scored 15 of her game-high 23 points in the second half. She scored nine points during an 11-2 run late in the third quarter as the Lady Devils (10-6 overall, 3-3 in the 5A-East Conference) took their first lead since 2-0 in the first minute of the game.

Hazley’s stickback of her own miss with 2:09 left in the third quarter gave the West Memphians a 29-28 cushion.

The Lady Devils led 3430 after three quarters.

“When (Hazley’s) under control, she’s really good,” Tate added. “Sometimes she still tries to force things, but we’ve been on her constantly about playing under control.She’s getting better.”

Greene County Tech’s Brooke Barnes converted a basket from in close with 1:18 to play in the second quarter to give the hosts a 23-12 lead.

The Eagles led 23-14 at halftime.

Ice cold from the field in the first half, the Lady Devils could manage only a 7 of 23 shooting performance.

But in the second half, with Hazley slicing up the Tech defense with her penetrating, the Lady Devils hit on 12 of 22 from the field for a .521 percentage.

“Our shot selection in the second half was way better,” Tate commented.

The Lady Devils also outrebounded Tech (9-8, 2-4) 31-18.

A Tierra Bradley layup with 5:50 to play in the fourth quarter gave West Memphis a 50-40 lead, but with 1:42 still to play, the Techsters sliced the lead in half at 45-40 when Barnes, who scored 7 points, got a basket off a steal.

But the Lady Devils calmly sank 4 of 6 free throws in the final 1:08 in the game to seal the decision.

Senior Kenya Freeman added 9 points for West Memphis while Bradley hit 8 and Ta’Nya Burnett scored 6.

Sabrina Kellett paced the Greene County Tech attack with 14 points while Tiffany Gramling chipped in 13.

The Lady Devils return home Friday night to face Mountain Home.

The Lady Devils got a game-high 23 points from Aryah Hazley (1) against Greene County Tech.