The Lady Dillos had a nice week of basketball as they captured five wins plus a Championship trophy at the Albany tournament.

We opened up home play last week against the Lady Buffaloes of Florence and it was sure good to be home after a week of travel. We had a great half of basketball as we tallied 33 points in the first quarter and held a commanding 58-11 lead at halftime.

We did a great job of pressuring the ball which lead to several turnovers and easy baskets. The big lead allowed our starters to get some much needed rest after a very hard Burnet tournament. Some of our reserves got big minutes in the second half which should help their confidence and we cruised home with a 83-25 win.

Our next venture was a condensed two day tournament in Albany which is a ways from San Saba. The format was changed due to the football playoffs and our girls were forced to play four games in two days.

Not that we can’t do this but two games in one day usually doesn’t fare well for us. By the time our second game rolls around we’re usually running a bit on fumes due to our uptempo style and pressure defense; nevertheless, we prevailed and brought home a 1st place finish in a wild and wooly overtime contest with the home team.

The plan at the beginning of the year was to take a nice thirty-three mile Hill Country cruise over to Llano but they canceled their tournament on us. The reason was that the tournament didn’t have enough teams but I know of five teams that were entered and can’t figure out why a four team round robin wasn’t played but oh well, to each their own.

We opened up tournament play with a resounding 49-20 win over Archer City. We scored twenty four points in the first quarter and held a 31-5 lead at halftime. Our jump defense really gave the Lady Wildcats fits.

Haylee Oliver lead us in scoring with 12 followed by Shelby Hardy with 10, Calea Turner with 9 and Katy Davis with 8. Haylee had 5 steals and Calea had 3 assists to lead us in these categories. Haylee also captured 5 boards as well.

In the second game we faced the Lady Tigers of Hico. We defeated them 56-37. We were only up twelve at half, 29-17 but we had a great third quarter and pushed the lead to 49-29.

They had two really good guards who gave us some fits but we corraled them a bit more in the second half and pushed on in the winners side of the bracket.

Calea had 4 assists, Oliver captured 9 boards and Bianca Zepeda, Tarah Crosby and Shelby Hardy each recorded 3 steals apiece to lead in these areas.

The next morning we arose EARLY to play Haskell at 9:25 a.m. Just a side note for all you San Angelo Subscribers. I didn’t throw my San Saba route because of course I was in Albany. Sue Crawford subs for me at times when I have to miss and she does a GREAT job for me and is appreciated. I awoke at my normal 4:30 a.m. time in Albany because I couldn’t sleep and for all of you inquiring minds, there’s not much going on in Albany at 4:30 a.m. Also, the Abilene Reporter gets there LATE, just like the San Angelo at times, so subscribers there’s delays everywhere in the state of TEXAS.

Well enough of that, now back to the game. We were ready to go and jumped on Haskell early and took a commanding 18-6 lead after one quarter. We wound up defeating the Lady Indians 45-26. I was really proud of our defense and our blockouts. Blocking out is one area that we have been focusing on so it was good to see some of the fruits of our labor.

Oliver netted 12 points followed by Hardy with 10 and Turner with 9. We next played the Lady Lions from Albany and won a wild affair 50-43 in overtime. We shot very poorly in this game.

They ran a 1-3-1 and we got a ton of open looks but we couldn’t knock any shots down. To quote an old coach, “we couldn’t throw it in the ocean”. We were down seven at halftime.

We didn’t panic and we showed a great deal of poise in the second half. I could tell real early in the third quarter that defense was going to be what pulled us through. We kept playing hard and got a couple of steals which lead to easy baskets for us.

We were down two late in the game and Albany was running their delay game. Haylee Oliver forced her girl sideline and Calea Turner rear jumped her and Tarah Crosby rotated up and got a steal and made a big lay up that knotted the score at 41.

We did have a chance to win in regulation but we missed a couple of shots. We settled down in overtime and captured a big road win.

Danessa Vasquez stepped up in this game and played some big minutes for us. She played well in the Haskell and Albany games.

Albany has a player named M.J. Vickers who is the real deal. She scored 22 points on us and might be the best kid we’ve faced all year.

Calea Turner, Katy Davis, Shelby Hardy, and Haylee Oliver were all named to the All Tournament Team.Tuesday we will have opened up District play against the Dublin Lady Lions.

On Friday we travel to Bangs for our second district game before the Christmas Break.

We saw Bangs at Albany and they will be a force to reckon with in District. Coach Beck has them playing well and we better have our “A” game when go to Dragon Land if we expect to capture a road win.