Lady Cats' rally comes up short in finals

Staff report

CANYON, Texas — A tough run of just over 24 hours was a little much for Clovis High’s girls on Saturday.

After pulling out tight wins over Amarillo Tascosa (55-53) and host Canyon (40-39) on Friday, the Lady Wildcats came up short in their bid to erase a 15-point, second-half deficit in losing to Abilene Wylie 49-45 in the finals of the Tournament of Champions.

Brittany Brewer, a 6-foot-4 senior post, scored 17 points while senior guard London Weilert added a pair of 3-pointers and 12 points for the Lady Bulldogs (9-3).

It was the first regular-season loss for the Lady Cats (3-1) since falling at district rival Hobbs in February 2013. Clovis won the then-Class 5A state title that season, and took its only loss last year against eventual champion Volcano Vista in the 5A semifinals.

“Hopefully, if we have a few losses this year, we’ll learn from them and we won’t lose at the wrong time like we did last year,” CHS coach Jeff Reed said.

Senior guard Danni Williams scored 24 points for Clovis while senior post Shelby Jones, seeing her most extensive action so far as she tries to recover from a knee injury originally sustained during the soccer season, added 10 points.

Clovis led 10-8 after one quarter, but the Lady Bulldogs dominated the middle two stanzas, outscoring CHS 31-15 in that time to take a 14-point cushion into the final segment.

“They made a little run on us right before halftime,” Reed said. “Then we came out a little flat in the third quarter, which we’ve done several times this season.”

The Lady Cats extended their defensive pressure in the final period and quickly cut their deficit to four points, but they were unable to get any closer even though the Lady Bulldogs left the door a bit ajar by missing the front end of two 1-and-1s.

Clovis went 7-of-8 from the line in the period, while Wylie was just 3-of-7.

“We had our chances, but we could never get over the top,” Reed said. “We put on fullcourt pressure and we got a lot of opportunities with turnovers.

“We got them rattled, but when you’re down by 15 it’s hard to come back.”

Jones, whose playing time has been closely monitored to this point, was active on the court. But fellow senior post Dee Briggins was limited after getting into foul trouble.

“We really never had both of them in for very long at a time,” Reed said.

CHS returns to action on Tuesday with a 7 p.m. tipoff at Lovington, then opens play in next weekend’s Mel Otero Invite at Rio Rancho with a 3 p.m. quarterfinal game on Thursday against Roswell High.