Nocona
The Nocona Lady Indians continued their playoff run and undefeated streak by beating Valley Mills on Thursday night in the area round.
The Lady Indians won with little drama 78-44 when it came to the final score, but it did not start that way.
Nocona came in as heavy favorites with the undefeated record on the season. Valley Mills finished second in its district, losing only to district champion Hamilton who twice lost the same night to a Windthorst team the Lady Indians have beaten three times this season.
Still, the Lady Eagles were not just going to lay down against Nocona and while the Lady Indians youth have not blinked so far this season, it doesn’t mean they won’t with the stakes now being the highest.
That must explain the first quarter where the game was competitive throughout and Valley Mills was up 16-13 heading into the second quarter.
“I thought we came out flat in the first quarter,” Kyle Spitzer said. “Defensively we were not in the spots we needed to be in.”
Those issues got ironed out and then it was another Nocona basketball game. Valley Mills scored only nine points in each of the next two quarters and 10 in the last one.
Meanwhile, Nocona’s offense took off, running in transition and making 3-pointers off of drives to the basket in the halfcourt. The Lady Indians scored 25, 22 and 18 points in the final quarters as they grabbed the lead and made it grow throughout the game until the final buzzer sounded.
The first quarter memories disappeared as Nocona won with little issue 78-44.

Saint Jo
The Saint Jo Lady Panthers fell short against state-ranked Dodd City on Thursday night.
The Lady Hornets won 65-28 against the young Lady Panthers team.
Dodd City came in as favorites, rated among the top 10 in the state in 1A according to the Texas Association of Basketball Coaches poll.
It was a matching of styles as both teams came in wanting to aggressively full court press on defense and push the ball in transition.
It was physical throughout and just because a girl hit the floor hard did not always guarantee a foul being called as the ball was sprinted up and down the floor.
Dodd City showed having more experience and skill, bottling up Saint Jo’s two ball handlers into backcourt turnovers at times and slicing through the Lady Panthers zone to open 3-point shooters who made nine on the night.
Saint Jo competed well in the first quarter, but the better shooting from Dodd City meant the Lady Hornets were up 23-10.
Unfortunately for the Lady Panthers, that would be a quarter high for them as they just got wore down by Dodd City’s press. The Lady Hornets were constantly subbing in fresh players while Saint Jo did not have that luxury do to some injuries later in the season.
The foul calls did start to pick up on both sides in the second half and the Lady Panthers did go 11-20 at the free throw line.
Still, it was not enough to get Saint Jo back into the game offensively as the Lady Hornets scoring pace kept up until the fourth quarter.
The Lady Panthers held them to only five points to end the game, but did not do much better scoring one point as the press did not let up until the final seconds of the game.
Dodd City won 65-28.

Bellevue
The Bellevue Lady Eagles season came to an end on Tuesday night in the bi-district round against Throckmorton.
The Lady Greyhounds won handidly against the young Lady Eagles 62-19 to end their season.
Still, it was a success for a team that came into the season with a lot of youth. While last year’s team struggled with no bench depth, this year’s team had it in spades but at the cost of youthful inexperience.
Those growing pains had to be gone throughout the season and the team had some difficult moments.
Still, Bellevue got its self together during district play enough to not just sneak into the playoffs, but finish third in a tough, top heavy district which had several good teams battling for the last two spots.
The Lady Eagles won some close games to earn the third spot and with a majority of the team being underclassmen, this could just be the first step up in the ladder back to competing for a district title in a few years.

To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekend edition of the Bowie News.