By Cody Stark
Assistant Sports Editor
HOUSTON — HOUSTON — Kingwood Park hung around and hung around, but the Lady Hornets were just too strong down the stretch.
Huntsville finally wore down a feisty Lady Panthers squad in the fourth quarter to cruise to a 69-54 victory in the area round of the Class 4A girls basketball playoffs Friday night at the Campbell Center.
Junior post Ronisha Major caught fire in the second half, scoring 20 of her game-high 26 points after the break, as the Lady Hornets (23-7) advanced to the Region III quarterfinals where they will play either Buda Hays or Beaumont Central early next week.
“I knew coming into the game that they only had a six- or seven-man rotation, so our plan was to wear them down so that in the fourth quarter they would miss some shots,” Huntsville head coach Jay Oliphant said. “They were pretty relentless. They fought us hard all night long. We just had some players step up tonight.”
Major was one of those players in the second half. She almost singlehandedly held Kingwood Park at bay in the third quarter.
The Lady Hornets took a 33-29 lead into the break after Lady Panthers guard Kristi Murphy, who scored 16 points, hit one of her four 3-pointers at the buzzer.
Major almost outscored Kingwood Park by herself in the third period, scoring eight points as compared to 12 total for the Lady Panthers. Huntsville freshman Mya Perry drained a 3 and junior Karla Kizzee added a basket to give the Lady Hornets a 46-41 lead going into the fourth.
“I didn’t want them to come back on us and beat us because we don’t put two halves together,” Major said. “We did tonight. I stepped up because I played bad our last game.”
Major picked up where she left off in the fourth quarter. She hit two free throws and sophomore Breanna Fuller scored on an offensive rebound to push the lead to nine.
Senior guard Shonecra James, who chipped in 12 points, appeared to nail the door shut when she drained a 3 to make it an 11-point game with six minutes to go.
But Kingwood Park made one final push. Senior forward Larla Brown (10 points) scored a layup and Murphy hit a 3 as the Lady Panthers went on an 8-2 run to get to within 59-52 with under three minutes left in the game.
Major answered with two straight layups and James and Fuller combined to score the final four points of the game to seal it.
“(James) and Mya Perry both hit some big 3s for us tonight,” Oliphant said. “They were kind of momentum takers because Kingwood Park would go on a run and we would come back and hit a 3. Those shots worked out real well for us.”
The Lady Panthers took control of the game early, jumping out to an 8-3 lead because they were patient with the ball and didn’t fold under Huntsville’s relentless press.
Lady Hornets sophomore point guard Ceidra Coleman had a solid first quarter, scoring eight of her 10 points in the period to help Huntsville grab a 15-14 lead.
Perry and James both connected from long range in the second quarter to help the Lady Hornets get some breathing room before Murphy’s long shot sent the game into halftime.
“We are one step closer to our goal of going to state,” said Perry, who finished with 11 points. “We did awesome tonight. We have been working on shooting in practice and we were able to hit some big shots tonight.”
