Girls’ Basketball: Sussex Central 49, Charles City 46

Charles City's Adrienne Miles (left) defends a lay-up attempt by Sussex Central's Lacoura Ellis

Andre' Jones photo

Charles City’s Lady Panthers put together a variety of small runs to pull away from the visiting Sussex Central Lady Tigers. But the Tiger back court duo of Lacoura Ellis and Tiasha Hill overcame each scoring outburst by the hosts.

Hill scored the first five points and Ellis scored the final 10 points as the visiting Tigers defeated the home-standing Lady Panthers 49-46 in the Dec. 11 Tri-Rivers District basketball opener for both.

Both teams played a back-and-forth game throughout the second half. Cheyenne Davis’s three-pointer cut the visitors’ lead to one at 33-32. Charles City sophomore Adrienne Miles followed suit, putting together an 8-1 individual scoring run to give the hosts their biggest lead of the night 40-34 with four minutes remaining.

After a Tiger time out, Hill answered with a corner three-pointer and a runner to slice the margin to one. Ellis’ free throw nodded the game at 40 apiece and a lay-up coupled with a foul would give Sussex a three-point lead with 1:52 remaining.

The fall-out continued for the Lady Panthers. Starting point guard Hailey Holmes went down to an injury while back court teammate Davis would foul out with 1:32 showing on the game clock. Then, a turnover led to two Ellis free throws to bump the score to 45-40 in favor of Sussex.

Charles City’s Jessica Hill brought the hosts back within one with a pair of free throws and a lay-up with 38 seconds remaining, but once again Ellis back-to-back fastbreak lay-ups would be the final scores and put the game out of reach.

After the game, Charles City head coach Vashaun Otey spoke about the sequence of events with Holmes injury and Davis fouling out.

“That was the key point of the game,” he said. “Defensively, we did alright, but on offense we were stagnant.

“From the beginning of the game we came out sluggish and turnovers plagued us,” he continued. “We did a good job on the glass but we failed to convert on opportunities tonight.

Miles led Charles City (4-2, 0-1 Tri-Rivers) with 13 points while Hill and Davis also reached double figures with 12 and 10 respectively. The Lady Panthers received four points from Myonka Boyd and two each from Taylor Bradby, Kayla Otey, and Holmes, and Sara Whitehead chipped in one.

Sussex Central (1-1, 1-0) received 20 points from Ellis and 18 from Hill.