Charles Henderson contained the twin towers of LeFlore in the first half Tuesday in the Class 5A South Regional semifinals, but the Lady Rattlers found their shot from downtown, which freed up the dominant force of the LeFlore post game and gave LHS a 66-45 victory.

“They had a lot of weapons,” CHHS head coach Dyneshia Jones said. “From what I heard they had two good post players and we worked on that in the four days we had to practice, but they did a good job against us. And they had some guards in there start hitting three-pointers.”

Jocelyn Shaw and Shanece McKinney, the twin towers, combined for only 11 points and eight rebounds in the first half Tuesday, but had 31 points and 15 rebounds combined at the end of the day. Shaw had 21 points and eight rebounds and McKinney added 10 points and seven rebounds.

What opened the post up for LeFlore (22-2) was the hot hand of guard Gabrielle Williams. Williams scored 17 points and hit 3-of-5 three-pointers, all in the second half.

“We just had better execution in the second half,” LHS head coach Darrell Walton said. “Thank the Lord we were still in it after the first half because we should not have been in it after the way we played. They got their act together in the second half and we started going inside more.”

The Lady Trojans (14-12) jumped out to a 16-7 lead after the first quarter and seemed to be rolling, but two three pointers from LeFlore’s Bessie Carson opened up the zone in the second quarter

“In the first half we took the ball in and penetrated a little bit and got the big girls in foul trouble,” Jones said. “That helped tremendously, but then on the other end we tried to play the 2-3 zone to pack in the paint because of their good post players. But then the guard started hitting threes and that got us.”

Niara Shipmon led the Lady Trojans with 19 points, but she said the shots just were not going for the team in the second half.

“We had good shot selection, but they just not falling,” Shipmon said.

Senior Erica Henderson added 17 points in the loss. Cameron Debose contributed four points and Ameria Blakely chipped in three points.

“It was just one of those bad shooting days,” Jones said. “They didn’t stop us on offense, we just couldn’t hit anything.”

No matter the outcome, Jones said this has been another successful season for the Lady Trojans of Charles Henderson.

“I am proud of them,” she said. “This is our fourth year making it here and we can’t make it over that edge, but I am still proud of them for getting here every year. That means they are doing something good in the postseason every year. Hopefully we will be back here next year and we want to come talk with you all last (instead of first since we lost).”

Click for a photo gallery of Tuesday’s action