Clarkrange pulls away late to defeat Marion County
JASPER, Tenn. — The mixture of an all-state post and a backcourt that got hot from behind the arc in the second half was too much for the Marion County girls’ basketball team to overcome Saturday night.
The Lady Warriors, who had battled Clarkrange well into the fourth quarter, countering every scoring run by the visitors with one of their own, finally wore down in the final five minutes, falling 73-58 in a Class A sectional.
“We gave outstanding effort,” Lady Warriors coach Randy Ellis said. “We never quit, right up until the final seconds but when they’ve got the combination of their post and their outside game going like they did in the second half, they’re just really tough to defend.”
Clarkrange’s 6-foot-4 all-stater Kara Meadows was unstoppable at times, helping the Lady Buffaloes (25-10) build a 10-point lead less than a minute into the second quarter. Meadows scored 13 straight points during one second-quarter stretch and 15 of her team’s last 17 before halftime. The Middle Tennessee State University signee finished with a game-high 29 points and 11 rebounds.
“Every time I get the ball near the basket I’m confident that I’m going to score,” Meadows said. “I know it’s my job to put the ball in the hole, but I also have confidence in the rest of my team that when they’re open and I pass it back out, they’re going to hit their shots, too.”
Marion opened the second half with a 9-5 run to grab its first lead of the game, but Clarkrange quickly answered with an 11-2 surge highlighted by three 3-pointers, including back-to-back treys from Charity Crabtree.
The Lady Warriors (252), whose only other loss was to Class AAA McMinn County in mid-December, got back as close as three on a steal and layup from Breanna Vinson, but again Clarkrange answered, getting consecutive 3-pointers from Breanna Bush in a 30-second span.
The Lady Buffaloes, who have eight state championships and two runner-up finishes in program history, including two years ago, closed out the game on a 10-0 run and made 8 of 10 free throws in the second half. Bush finished with 14 points and Hannah Garrett had 18 for Clarkrange, combining for seven 3-pointers.
Hannah Phillips led Marion with 22 points and Emily Webb added 19.
“We tried about everything we could think of to slow Meadows down — man, zone, fronting her, doubling her — but she still found ways to get open,” Ellis said. “We wanted to make some of their other girls take shots, but when they did they just kept making big shot after shot.
“I can’t say enough about the run we’ve had or how proud I am of the way we played. But it hurts to see it end so close to the state tournament.”
Contact Stephen Hargis at shargis@timesfreepress. com or 423-757-6293. Follow him on Twitter @StephenHargis.