Coming off a tournament championship run at Alvord, the Nocona Lady Indians faced a tough challenge against Ponder at home on Tuesday.
The Lady Lions wore thin the six-girl rotation of the Lady Indians, winning with a shot at the buzzer 53-51.
Nocona got off to a great start in the game. The never ending press defense and constantly lineup changers from Ponder did not affect the Lady Indians early on. Cousins Trystin Fenoglio and Averee Kleinhans seemed to easily play keep-away making it up the court against the press and even used the aggressiveness against them.
Kleinhans early and often found Kylie Rose streaking down the court and made long outlet passes to her ahead of the defense. Rose responded with several layups and three made three-pointers, outscoring the Lady Lions in the first quarter by herself with 15 points.
Nocona led 24-12 after the first quarter and string of high scoring games from the tournament looked like it might continue.
Unfortunately, Ponder’s defense picked up the intensity the rest of the game and slowly climbed back while the Lady Indians white hot offensive performance in the first quarter came back down to earth for the rest of the game.
The game was a physical, muddy affair with bodies hitting the floor for loose balls constantly for the rest of the game. Nocona had trouble keeping the Lady Lions from getting offensive rebounds, which led to many second chance points. Ponder had cut the lead to 32-24 at halftime.
The fatigue really started to show for the Lady Indians in the second half. Uncharacteristic mistakes started to happen. Breaking the press, which seemed trivial in the first quarter, became a momentous task as the game wore on and produced turnovers. Simple dribble handoffs from the Lady Lions produced uncontested layups. Wide open three-pointers were missed.
Nocona scored enough to keep its lead, but the double digit lead it had after the first quarter was down to one score 41-38 heading into the fourth quarter.
Early on Ponder took the lead and held a 51-46 lead with a little more than two minutes left in the game.
The Lady Indians found its second wind with their back against the wall. Kleinhans made some free throws to cut the lead to 51-48.
The Lady Lions ran a minute off the clock as Nocona had to foul them three times before they were in the bonus to shoot free throws.
Ponder missed and Kleinhans came down and made a three-pointer to tie the game with 37 seconds left.
Nocona’s defense came up big again as it forced a turnover and called a time out with 17 seconds left with a chance to win the game.
The Lady Indians passed ahead of the press quickly and dribbled into the lane hoping to draw contact on a shot. The quick hands put the ball on the floor and a mad scramble to secure it.
Ponder did and raced up the floor, though the transition defense of Nocona cut her off as the rest of the players ran up the court.
She passed it to a teammate at the top of the key, who had room to her left to drive into the lane before pulling for a short contested shot. The ball went in as time ran out, securing the Lady Lions a 53-51 win.
Nocona plays at the Aledo tournament this weekend before traveling to Melissa to play 6:15 p.m. on Dec. 17.

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