Swarming defense

Giselle Martinez passes to a teammate.

By Brian Besch
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Lady Hornet basketball used a big second quarter and good defense Tuesday to defeat Leggett 46-28 in Goodrich.

After a 6-6 tie to end the first quarter, Goodrich came out on fire. They started the second quarter with a 9-0 run in just 1:30 of clock. The Lady Hornet dominance would continue throughout the period, with an 18-4 eight minutes.

“They did a good job and I told them that we wanted to pull back and play a 2-3 zone,” Goodrich coach Pinellafie Johnson said. “The minute we did that, we just started watching rebounds. The rebounds came to us, but we didn’t go get them. We did offensively, but defensively, we did a lot of standing around waiting for the ball to come to us. We had to stay in the press in order to keep on top of the game. They did a good job with it. I told them that even though we are not placed in anything right now, you got to get out here and play just like you were playing for first place. I told them to not quit on themselves and finish the season. Hopefully, we can clean all that up for next year.”

Leggett scored six, four and five points in the first three quarters of the game to dig a 37-15 hole. However, they would fight back in the fourth, putting up 13 points and holding the Lady Hornets to nine.

Latrina Morgan led Goodrich and all scores with 20 points, while Bra’Niyah Wyatt had nine and Brianaly Resendez had seven. For Leggett, Bianca Perkins had eight, and Na’llah Jordan had seven.

“We have to be able to finish it and close it out,” Leggett coach Terri Barlow said. “We can’t worry about calls or little bumps on fouls. When you don’t get a foul call, you have to play through it. The referee will miss some. We have had our ups and downs. They are slowly getting it together now, so it took us the whole year. I told them that we are going to finish the year and I’m taking down everything and we are going to feed off of that for next year and be better.”

Leggett is 2-9 and out of the playoff picture for the 2023-24 season, and Goodrich is in fifth place, needing some help from other teams.

“The only way that we can get in is if Spurger loses, then we can tie for fourth, but we can’t get a place right now unless someone loses,” Johnson said.

Leggett’s final two games of the season are hosting Zavala Friday and at Brookeland. Goodrich will make the long trip to High Island Friday and host Spurger Tuesday.