Lady Bears win second straight
Published 9:37 am Friday, January 11, 2013
AHOSKIE – Two makes it a streak.
The Lady Bears used a 22-point effort from Brandi Burden and a double-digit performance from both Kyara Rodgers and Vanessa Mitchell as they downed Currituck County High School 58-51 Tuesday.
Kayla Powell paced Currituck with 22 points.
Hertford County got out to a big lead early and then held off a Currituck challenge when Mitchell was injured in the fourth quarter.
“We played together tonight,” first-year HCHS skipper Sha-Teisa Sharpe said. “We fought through adversity when Vanessa went down early in the fourth quarter. We got good guard play tonight.”
Hertford County jumped out to a 12-0 lead in the early going of the contest. Desiree James scored the first bucket of the night and was followed by a free throw from Mitchell and another James hoop as the Bears led 5-0.
Burden then hit a pair of free throws while Bailey Nicholas added one shot from the charity stripe. Meanwhile, Rodgers and Ashanti Basnight hit from the floor and the HCHS lead was a dozen.
Powell finally stopped the spurt with a pair of free throws that got the Knights within 12-2 at the end of the first quarter.
Brooke Adams scored from the floor for Currituck to open the second quarter, marking the first basket of the night for the visiting squad. That score was answered with consecutive hoops from Rodgers and Dyani Hall as the Bears surged ahead 16-4.
Currituck scored six of the next eight points to trim the deficit to eight (18-10), but Burden and Hall hit back-to-back shots and the Bears were again up by double digits.
The Lady Knights, however, answered with another spurt in which they scored six of the next eight points and got to within 24-16 at the intermission.
Powell trimmed the deficit even more with a hoop at the beginning of the second half, but HCHS responded by rolling off 13 unanswered points as they pulled out to a 37-18 edge.
Currituck came back to roll off nine of the next 11 thanks to a trio of three-pointers off the hands of Amanda Gerni. That closed the gap to a dozen (39-27). By the end of the third quarter the Lady Bears reached a 16-point margin (48-32) thanks to a late three-pointer by Mitchell.
Megan Matulewicz hit a three-pointer for the Knights to start the fourth quarter and spark an 11-2 spurt that closed the gap to 50-43. Later Powell had six points in an eight-point spurt and got the Knights within 54-49.
Burden hit a pair of late free throws as did Rodgers and the Bears preserved the victory.
The Northeastern Coastal Conference victory pushed the Lady Bears to 3-1 in the league while leaving them 5-7 overall.