North Greene used overwhelming defensive pressure and a balanced offensive attack on Monday to get day three of the Andrew Johnson Bank Ladies Classic started with a 59-31 win over Chuckey-Doak.
“The kids came out and played hard. They had a lot of energy early which is always a question mark in a nine o’clock in the morning game,” North Greene coach James Buchanan said. “We got everyone in today, and hopefully it got everybody back in a good rhythm.”
With the win the Lady Huskies advance to play Tennessee High on Wednesday at 9 a.m. while Chuckey-Doak will play Cherokee at 9 a.m. on Tuesday. Then two teams will square off again on Friday at the Huskies’ Den.
“Once we go back and study the film I’m sure we’ll do some things different, and they will too,” Buchanan said. “It’s going to be a quick turnaround, but we’ll put all our focus into Tennessee High right now.”
With 7:06 left in the first quarter North Greene took the lead for good when Tralyn Southerland hit Eva Leonard on a backdoor cut for a layup.
One steal by Josie Graham led to a three-pointer from Leonard, and another Graham steal set up her own breakaway layup that gave the Lady Huskies a 12-2 lead with 3:22 left in the opening frame.
North Greene’s defense shut down Chuckey-Doak in the early going and it took the Lady Black Knights nearly seven minutes for their first field goal to fall. Chloe Kirkpatrick got the breakthrough bucket, but North Greene finished the period leading 18-5.
Inside the first minute of the second quarter Ella Head made a free throw before Natalie Foshie set up Graham on the block for what turned into three points the old-fashioned way.
Chuckey-Doak’s Jayden Myers responded with a full-court layup and then a triple from the right wing. Then North Greene got one three-pointer from Cadie McDevitt and two triples from Eva Leonard as the lead grew to 32-14.
In the closing minutes of the first half Southerland made four free throws for North Greene and Cristen Bishop scored inside twice for Chuckey-Doak.
At the break North Greene led 36-18.
The Lady Huskies spread the attack around on Monday with its five starters scoring between eight and 14 points. Leonard hit from deep four times and scored 14 points to go with four steals and three assists. Graham had 13 points and nine rebounds.
“That is what we are looking for,” Buchanan said. “We don’t want to be a team that revolves around one player, that’s too easy to defend. We like that we have several that can hurt you, it’s just about making the right reads. They threw some extra people inside at times today, and we did a good of finding the shooter. I would have liked to be better in transition today, but in the half court we were making the right reads.”
North Greene’s lead reached 20 points 56 seconds into the third quarter when McDevitt was left open for a triple from the corner. Head then scored off an offensive rebound, and then McDevitt found Graham open on the inside for a 45-20 advantage with 4:44 left in the quarter.
The period ended with Leonard hitting from deep again, Foshie turning an offensive rebound into three points the hard way, and Graham scoring on an inbound play as the advantage grew to 55-25.
The reserves did most of the work in the fourth quarter. North Greene’s biggest lead was 59-25 after Kinlea Eastep rolled in a floater from in front of the rim.
In the final two minutes Myers scored three points and Sarah Yates hit from beyond the arc to close the gap to 59-31.
Myers had 12 points and five steals on Monday for the Lady Black Knights.
