First-year head coach Kelley Greer of Winston Academy challenged Kirk Academy before the season at Madison-Ridgeland and her team came up short in a 57-34 loss.
When they met again last Monday night, it was a different story and that story had a much different ending. The Lady Patriots went on the road to face off with the Lady Raiders and knocked them off 31-30. They followed that up the next night on the road at Winona Christian with a 44-30 win there.
In the first game of the week, WA was led by Hailey Bradford and Dshiya Jones as they combined for 22 of the team’s 31 points. Bradford finished with a game-high 12 points and Jones had 10 points.
Against Winona Christian it was much of the same from the two players as Jones had 18 and Bradford had 10.
The Lady Patriots (3-1) are winners of three -straight games after losing the season opener at Starkville Christian. They’re back on the road this week as they travel to Hillcrest Christian on Friday.
BOYS
On the flip side, it was a tough week for the WA boys who also had two quality opponents on the road.
After trailing by 20 points in the first half against Kirk Academy, head coach Jordan Graham’s team battled back and cut the lead to six in the fourth quarter before falling 48-41. It was a game that he felt really showed him a lot about his team.
“Before the game I talked about Chase Rose and he was what we thought he would be,” Graham said of the Kirk standout. “I think he’s one of the best players in the state. We tried a 2-3 zone to see if we could catch them off guard. We struggled offensively in the first half and were down a pretty big margin. We battled back and I was very encouraged by that.”
The Patriots scored nine points in the first half but came back and put up 32 in the second half thanks to 22 points in the fourth quarter. Brylee Wall led the way in the game with 17 points and Cage Palmer had 13 points scoring all of them in the second half. Both players hit a trio of 3-pointers each.
In the second game of the week, WA traveled to Greenwood to take on Delta Streets Academy and former basketball coach Justin Childs.
Delta Streets came out on top with a 68-39 win as the Patriots couldn’t hold an early lead in the game. WA led 17-6 in the first quarter before Delta Streets took over in the game. Palmer had 19 points.
“Any time you face a Justin Childs’ team, you’re going to get a lot of defensive and offensive sets thrown at you. I was proud of my guys in the first half. Delta put the pressure on us but everything they threw at us, we seemed to answer it,” Graham said.
“Second half we struggled offensively. We turned the ball over too much. We’re taking it as a learning experience and we’re not going to let one game define us. I think Delta Streets will be a frontrunner to win the state championship so we’re going to keep plugging along.”
The Patriots fell to 1-3 on the season with the loss but they’re hoping to bounce back this week despite the schedule continuing to be a tough one.
WA travels to Hillcrest Christian on Friday.
“They’re another great, athletic, talented team. They have great length. By what I saw this summer at camp, they’re one of the premier teams in the MAIS, in my opinion,” Graham said. “They can definitely play some ball. We’re going to use this long week of practice as an example for us to look at ourselves.
