RED OAK – The Lady Bears wasted little time giving Justin Frederes his first win.

Hertford County overwhelmed Nash Central here Wednesday night 56-42, giving the Bears a win in their season-opener and providing Frederes his first career prep victory in his inaugural game at the helm.

“It feels great to get the first win,” Frederes said afterwards. “It shows we are moving in the right direction. We want to continue to improve as we move into conference play.”

Briante Bond led all scorers with 19 points for HCHS while Jaleesa Chinn had 12 and Brandi Burden added 10 points. Charneice Speight led Nash Central with 13 points.

Hertford County trailed through much of the first half before getting its offense rolling in the third quarter.

Zae Bass scored the first hoop of the second half for Nash Central to give the Lady Bulldogs a 27-23 lead, but it was all HCHS after that.

Bond and Burden had back-to-back hoops tying the score before Chinn hit a three-pointer at the 6:35 mark to make it 30-27 in favor of the Lady Bears. The 16-0 run continued when Burden scored again and Bond had consecutive hoops. Another Burden bucket was followed by a free throw from Camryn Jones that made it 39-27 with 3:01 to play in the third quarter.

Alexus Cooper stopped the spurt with a free throw, but Bond came back with a hoop for the Bears.

Nash Central closed the quarter on a 7-0 run to close back within 41-35. Cooper was the biggest catalyst with four points while Speight added three.

A pair of HCHS free throws by Deondra Morrison pushed the Lady Bears ahead 43-35 early in the fourth quarter. From there the two teams exchanged hoops until a Brittnay Clark bucket closed the Lady Bulldogs within 47-42 with less than four minutes to play.

One minute later Burden started a 9-0 spurt that closed out the game for the Bears. Morrison had four points on the spurt and Bond added three as the Lady Bears closed out the 14-point win.

In addition to those in double digits, the Lady Bears got eight from Morrison, six from Sherniece Futrell and one from Jones.

The game started slowly with Nash Central taking an early 6-0 lead thanks to three-pointers from Latavia McQueen and Grayson Bass. Bond finally got the Lady Bears on the board, but Brenae Hardy responded with a bucket that gave the home team an 8-2 lead.

A three-pointer by Chinn was answered immediately by McQueen, but the Bears closed the quarter on a 3-0 spurt (a hoop each by Morrison and Chinn) to get within 11-9.

Nash Central scored the first eight points of the second quarter to surge ahead 19-9, but Hertford County stormed back as Bond and Futrell had two buckets each to close the gap back to two (19-17).

The teams exchanged hoops for the remainder of the quarter to leave the Bears behind by two (25-23) at the intermission.

The Lady Bears (1-0) travelled to Edenton last night (Friday) for the Northeastern Coastal Conference opener.