Both the Ocean Springs girls and Pascagoula boys opened the Region 7-6A Tournament Monday night by defeating an opponent for the third straight time this season.
The Lady Greyhounds knocked off the Pascagoula Lady Panthers 50-40 in the opening game of the opening round of the league tourney, which is being contested at St. Martin High School.
It marked a clean sweep in a trio of meetings for the Lady greyhounds over the Lady Panthers this season. Ocean Springs, the second seed in the affair on the girls’ side of the bracket, moved to 16-8 overall on the season but more importantly clinched a spot in the championship game on Friday night as well.
In addition, Ocean Springs is now assured of a home game to open up the Class 6A state playoffs which begin next week. The Lady Greyhounds will face the winner of Tuesday night’s contest between top-seed D’Iberville and fourth-seed St. Martin in the championship game Friday night, while the Lady Panthers will meet the loser of Tuesday nights game Thursday night in the consolation game.
The contest was fairly even throughout the first half of play, thanks in part to Pascagoula’s standout post player Betnay Graves who tallied 14 points in the first half alone. Ocean Springs went to intermission with a one-point lead, at 22-21, thanks mostly to 11 first-half points from Kaleah Lowery.
The third frame proved to be the difference in the game however, as Ocean Springs used a balanced scoring attack to out-score Pascagoula 17-7 in the period and in the process take a commanding 39-28 lead into the final frame.
Five different players scored for the Lady Greyhounds in what turned out to be the decisive quarter, including De’shauvione Jones who scored all five of her points in the contest in the third frame, and lowery added two baskets for four points in that span as well.
The two teams traded baskets basically in the fourth period resulting in Ocean Springs taking the 10-point win.
Lowery added six more points in the final period to finish with a team-high 21 points for the winners, while Carlisha Briscoe, who added five points in the fourth quarter including a 3-pointer, chipped in 12 points to the winning effort as well.
Graves powered her way to a game-high 21 points as well for Pascagoula, while A’miyah Hedrick added seven points for the Lady Panthers.
In other action between the teams this season, OSHS won 46-37 in Pascagoula on Jan. 10th and then returned home one week later and registered an exciting 56-52 win before producing the ten-point win Monday night for the sweep.
The top-seeded Pascagoula Panthers dispatched fourth-seeded and tourney host St. Martin 59-37 to close out first-day action Monday night in the Region 7-6A Tournament. The Panthers will now move on to the title tilt Friday night against the winner of the Ocean Springs-‘Iberville game Tuesday night.
