Lady Trojans pull away late to top White County, advance to semifinals


 


Jason Peevyhouse

Editor, JP Productions Sports

It was a tough battle against, in places, a larger opponent, but the Lady Trojans will continue their pursuit of a second straight TSSAA Class 3A State Championship as Dyersburg ended the game on an 8-0 run to take a 52-42 win over White County in Thursday afternoon in the Murphy Center on the campus of Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro.


“We’re battle tested,” Dyersburg Head Coach Tim Strayhorn said during the postgame press conference. “We make our whole schedule hard.

“We don’t worry about records or whether we’re first, second, third, fourth in the state. We worry about this moment here – coming here and winning.”

Strayhorn explained scheduling tougher opponents was something he learned as a middle school head coach.

“We want to be battle-tested,” Strayhorn added. “I coached middle school basketball for a long time. In my experience from coaching middle school basketball, every time we got deep into the tournament, we always got eliminated because we didn’t play the competition we needed.

“So, coming to high school, I decided we were going to play teams that were going to push us to the limits so when we got here we wouldn’t be shell-shocked.”

Leading by one point heading into the fourth quarter, the Lady Trojans began to pull away early in the final frame. White County took the lead with an early bucket but a three-pointer from Kay Kay Strayhorn got the offense going and gave the lead back to the Lady Trojans. A pair of free throws from Joya Crawford made it a two-possession game midway through the fourth quarter. The Lady Warriors were to get a free throw from Lakekyn Grasty and a bucket by Gracie Clark to cut the lead back to 44-42.

Dyersburg got an assist from the White County bench as a technical foul was assessed on the Lady Warrior bench resulting in a Crawford free throw. The Lady Warriors were unable to convert a shot to a bucket through the rest of the game as Dyersburg hit seven of eight free throws down the stretch with freebies from Kalli Maclin, Strayhorn and four by Chelby Jordan to secure the win.

“A lot of times we play small ball, but we battle,” Strayhorn said of his team. “When the stage is bigger, we play better.”

The Lady Trojans took an early lead thanks to an Aerie Quinn three-pointer and a jumper by Joya Crawford. The Lady Warriors battled back, cutting the lead to one point after a bucket from Ava Jones. Dyersburg got the lead back to three following a layup by Kalli Maclin to go up 7-4. White County answered with back-to-back three-pointers from Jones to take the lead at 10-7. The Lady Trojans were able to retake the lead later in the quarter after a layup from Bri Parr and a jumper from Crawford before a late Lady Warrior bucket put White County on top 16-15 after one quarter.


Following an early bucket from Chelby Jordan, Jones sparked a scoring spree which saw Dyersburg only get a three-pointer from Bri Parr while White County got a three-pointer from Parr to take a 24-20 lead with 3:52 left in the half. But, a three-pointer from Jordan and a layup were followed by a pair of Crawford free throws to give the Lady Trojans a three-point lead with 2:11 left in the half. Though the Lady Warriors were able to score three points during the final two minutes, a jumper from Jordan with about a minute left helped Dyersburg take a 29-27 lead into the half.

Dyersburg extended its lead early in the third quarter with a bucket from Jordan but White County answered with a quick 7-2 run to take a 34-33 lead after a Jones three-pointer. The Lady Trojans got a pair of buckets from Parr and Crawford in response to help build a three-point lead before a pair of Gracie Clark free throws cut the Lady Trojan lead to 37-36 at the end of three quarters.

Despite more overall size on the White County roster, Dyersburg outrebounded White County 40-28 including 29 on the defensive end.

“Chelby rebounded well and the guards rebounded well,” Strayhorn said. “We knew we had to rebound well.”

Jordan led the way for Dyersburg with 17 points and 11 rebounds while Crawford had 13 points and seven boards.

The Lady Trojans advance to the TSSAA Class 3A Semifinals where Dyersburg will face the winner of the final quarterfinal game between Northview Academy and South Side at 5:30 p.m. on Friday in the Murphy Center on the campus of Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro.



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