Pea Ridge creates more winning plays
MORRILTON — In a game stacked with tide-turning plays, Pea Ridge made the biggest ones Wednesday to survive.
Lauren Wright knocked down a pair of free throws with 2.9 seconds left to send the Lady Blackhawks to a 42-37 victory over Nashville during the first round of the Class 4A girls state tournament at Devil Dog Arena.
Wright’s foul shots were just a sliver of what she did in a door-die game for Pea Ridge (23-5). The junior forward, whom Coach Heath Neal calls his team’s floor general, scored 9 points, pulled down 14 rebounds and came away with three steals. She also kept a number of possessions alive by running down loose balls, and she altered shots inside and out with her 5’10” frame.
“She’s such a phenomenal athlete,” Neal said of Wright. “Everybody looks at Blakelee (Winn) as being one of the best athletes in the state because she is, but Lauren is right there with her as far as athleticism goes. She’s our best rebounder by far. She’ll go up by the backboard and get it.
“She made a couple of little mistakes that she knows she did, but she never balked and kept us in a good spot in crunch time. When you’ve got kids like that, it makes coaching easy.”
The final free throws from Wright were made possible by Winn, Pea Ridge’s senior standout. With the Lady Blackhawks leading 40-37 with 7.1 seconds left, senior guard Aidan Dayberry missed the back end of a one-andone, but Winn ran down the rebound before passing to Wright, who closed it out at the line.
Junior guard Bella Cates hit
four 3-pointers in the first half and finished with a team-high 12 points for the Lady Blackhawks, who didn’t register their first lead until the 1:47 mark of the third quarter. Winn ended with 9 points, five rebounds and three steals.
For Nasvhille, freshman guard Olivia Dean, sophomore guard Kyleigh Scoggins and junior forward Sidney Townsend all had 9 points for Nashville (24-8), which responded from consecutive defeats last week by putting itself in position to win Wednesday.
After falling behind in the fourth quarter, Nashville — which led 23-21 at the half — tied it at 35-35 on Townsend’s bucket off the glass with 3:05 to go. The Scrapperettes didn’t make another shot the rest of the game.
“Both teams did what they needed to do to win, but when you get to this level, two or three plays make the difference in the game,” Nashville Coach Paul Dean said. “Those couple of plays just didn’t go our way. I’m proud of my kids, though. They fought to the end, and I wouldn’t change anything about the game — except the final outcome.”