The Bowie Lady Rabbits girl’s basketball team lost their season opener at Paradise on Tuesday night.
The Lady Panthers pulled away in overtime to win 62-52 in a game that was close throughout.
Bowie came into the game with only one full practice under its belt with many girls coming from volleyball. With only one returning starter and five returning varsity players, there is still a lot to figure out for Coach Matthew Miller, but he thought it went about as well as he could have hoped.
“My expectations heading into the game, they went above those expectations,” Miller said. “They fought hard. Being year two in the offensive system, we can focus on some of the little things. Our spacing was much better. All things considered, with the limited time and with Paradise getting every kid back and with practicing close to two weeks, we hung in there and had a chance to win the game late.”
His only returning starter, guard Maddie Mandela, played like it as she scored 26 points, grabbed six rebounds, had five steals and blocked a shot which were all team highs. Ziba Robbins also handled the ball and finished with a team high six assists.
Unfortunately, both fouled out late in the game, with Robbins fouling out near the end of regulation and Mandela fouling out in overtime. That combined with a Paradise player getting hot in overtime allowed the Lady Panthers to pull ahead.
Like recent years teams, Bowie is not going to be the biggest of teams, with the Robbins topping out at 5’10” as the tallest. While it does not directly correlate to rebounding, that is an area that will be stressed all season as Miller felt like the similarly sized Paradise team hurt them a lot on Tuesday grabbing offensive rebounds.

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