After watching their 33-game winning streak against district opponents end on their most recent trip down U.S. 119 last month (a 66-55 loss at Harlan County), the Bell County Lady Cats had no problems with focus on Tuesday at Harlan.
The Lady Cats dominated the paint with its imposing frontline led by 6-4 center Kairi Lamb and 6-1 forward Gracie Jo Wilder and took over the game early on the way to a 51-34 win. Harlan shot only 21 percent (13 of 61) from the field and was even worse from the 3-point line as the Lady Dragons missed 29 of 33 attempts.
“That was part of what we talked about in practice,” Bell County coach David Teague said. “We wanted to make sure we clogged the lane up and find certain shooters and get a hand up. I thought we did a good job the entire game defensively. That’s about as well as we’ve played defensively.”
Bell improved to 13-9 overall and 3-1 in district action with the win. Teague was happy with the way his team bounced back from the loss at Harlan County.
“They knew what we had going on there, and we didn’t play well that night, and it was a credit to Harlan County,” he said. “We’ve had a tough stretch of games. We told them in practice this was a big district game and the most important game we’ve played to this point. I thought the kids did a good job.”
Harlan coach Mackenzie King Varner was unavailable for comment.
Wilder was one of three Lady Cats in double figures with 17 points, Lauren McGeorge and Lamb added 15 and 11 points, respectively.
Junior forward Kylie Noe led the 13-10 Lady Dragons with 15 points. Aymanni Wynn scored nine.
Wilder had three baskets and McGeorge added two in the first quarter as Bell scored the first eight points on the way to an 18-7 lead after one quarter. Harlan had six turnovers in the period and missed eight of 11 shots.
Harlan’s offensive woes escalated in the second quarter as the Lady Dragons missed 16 of 18 shots, including nine straight 3-pointers. Lamb and McGeorge each had two baskets for Bell as the lead grew to 32-12 by halftime.
Harlan’s streak of 3-point misses stretched to 16 midway through the third quarter as Bell’s advantage reached 43-17 before Wynn broke the drought with two 3s in the final 90 seconds of the period to cut the deficit to 43-23.
Bell had its own struggles on offense in the second half, shooting 26 percent (seven of 27) from the field.
“Offense can come and go sometimes, but we kept working on the defensive end,” Teague said. “Harlan did a good job the second half of getting up on us and taking us out of some things.”
Harlan returns to action Friday at home against Harlan County. Bell County travels to Middlesboro on Thursday.