Girls Hoops: Cedar Hill too much for Lady Jags

HALTOM CITY — In a game that featured numerous spurts, it was Cedar Hill who closed the game with a 14-6 run Friday to hold off Flower Mound in a Class 5A area playoff game, 63-53.

The Lady Jaguars quickly fell behind, 9-2, and never led, trailing by as many as 14 points in the third period before getting within two, 49-47, with just more than four minutes remaining.

Laura McCoy scored 18 and Mallory Singleton added 14 for Flower Mound (21-14), while Cedar Hill’s (25-6) Diara Moore dropped in 20 and posts Ebony Jones and Braylah Blakely scored 15 and 12, respectively.

“We played them even in the second half,” said Flower Mound coach Sherika Nelson. “But, I think the first quarter kind of got us. You can’t give a team like that a big lead and come back and win. I think it was a mixture of turnovers and coming out a little anxious. I told them last year we played this same level of competition, but giving a 9-2 lead is not the way to start a playoff game. I think it came down to turnovers and offensive rebounds, and that got them too many good looks at the goal.”

Cedar Hill out-rebounded Flower Mound 29-25, including 16-8 on the offensive glass. The Lady Longhorns also forced the Lady Jaguars into 16 turnovers, while committing 10.

After Cedar Hill jumped out to a 9-2 advantage, Flower Mound was able to break the Lady Longhorns press to get lay-ups from Singleton and McCoy, as well as a basket and a foul by Melissa McDermott to tie the game, 9-9.

However, Cedar Hill quickly answered with seven straight and took a 21-13 lead at the end of the first period.

The teams played a back-and-forth second period, with Cedar Hill pushing its lead to 13 before a pair of free-throws by McCoy pulled Flower Mound back within 10, 35-25, at halftime.

Cedar Hill grabbed its biggest lead of the night, 45-31, after a bucket by Teylor Jones, before Flower Mound made its big run.

McCoy, who was 8-for-9 from the free-throw line on the night, hit a pair and assisted McDermott for a basket and a foul to cut the lead to 45-36.

Amy Freet converted five free-throws during the end of the third and start of the fourth to keep Flower Mound close, and a basket by McCoy with 35 seconds left had the Lady Jaguars within six, 47-41, after three periods.

Following a Cedar Hill timeout, Nelson designed a play on an inbounds pass and a cutting McCoy drove to the basket and scored to make it a two-point game.

But, Moore scored for the Lady Longhorns and was fouled, converting the free-throw, to break the momentum and push the lead back to five. Moore also converted 6-of-7 free-throws during the final three minutes to help seal the game.

“We got some big defensive stops and came down and turned them into points,” Nelson said, of what keyed the comeback. “We got in the 1-and-1 early and got some big free-throws and some big and-1’s. We made that lay-up off of the inbounds play, and they came right back down and got an and-1 and it kind of killed our momentum.”

All night we would get down 10 and kind of battle back. Then it would go back to seven and we would battle back, but just couldn’t get all the way back.”

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