girls from Region Tourney

By STEVEN G. WATSON

Sports Editor

PHENIX CITY ­ The Pike Liberal Arts Lady Patriots ended their season Friday in hard-fought fashion against Macon-East in the 3A East Area 1 Region Tournament.

After leading through most of the game, the Pike Liberal girls’ team fell victim to consistent foul shooting and pressure defense as Macon-East took a 49-37 win that propelled them into the championship game.

The Lady Patriots found themselves fighting through a rash of fouls early on that left many of the girls on the bench to take up the fight. PLAS matched them shot for shot, however, leading to a 24-21 lead at the half.

Macon-East was able to tie the game at 28-28 with 2:38 left in the third quarter, but PLAS put together a small run fueled by two putbacks by Katie Sanders to end the period up 33-30.

The fourth quarter proved to be the worst offensively for the Lady Patriots, however. They could only muster four total points with Macon exploding for 19.

"It was a total team effort," PLAS head coach Jim Ryan said. "Every girl out there gave their heart and soul and I’m very proud of them. They played their hearts out against a very, very good Macon team. We had them on the ropes, but the foul trouble killed us. Once it came to a free throw shooting contest we were in trouble because they were on fire from the line."

Macon-East hit 16-of-19 from the free throw line not missing in the fourth quarter while PLAS was only 3-of-8 overall.

Olivia Cox led the way for Macon with a game-high 18 points while Kristen Barringer had 14 and hit 10-of-12 from the charity stripe. Sanders led Pike Liberal with 10 and Kayla Petrey had seven.

Even with the loss, Ryan felt that his girls did their best and proved to many that they were a much better team than a year ago. The Lady Patriots finished last season with a 5-17 overall record and this year notched a 12-13 with the Tournament loss.

"I’m proud of our seniors, we more than doubled our win total from last year," Ryan said. "We won three Region games which is three more than we’ve won in the last two years.

"Pike Liberal is going to miss Shaunna Wheeler, Sabrina Swindle, Pamela Floyd and Kayla Petrey, they brought a lot of leadership to the team this year and I’m proud of the effort that they gave."