Girls basketball: Lady Rebels run away from Permian early

The Amarillo Tascosa girls basketball team arrived a little late for Tuesday’s District 2-5A contest against Permian because of weather issues on the roads from the Panhandle.

The Lady Rebels, however, were the ones with the most spring in their step at the start of the contest and when the Lady Panthers finally responded, it was too late.

Kayla Turner scored a game-high 18 points, including 12 in the first quarter, and the Lady Rebels held off Permian 58-53 at the Permian Fieldhouse.

Jasmie Brown added 17 for Amarillo Tascosa (6-3 overall, 1-1 district), which led by 11 at the end of the first quarter and as many as 14 in the first half before the Lady Panthers (5-4, 1-1) clawed back into the game in the second half.

“We did have a very good first quarter,” Lady Rebels coach Randy Courtney said. “I was happy that they got off the bus ready to play.

“I told the girls at halftime that Permian wasn’t going to quit and they didn’t. Angie’s doing a great job over here and the girls are playing hard for her.”

Cheyenne Swoopes and Italia Calderon each scored 12 points to lead the Lady Panthers. Permian next takes the court at 12:30 p.m. Thursday to face Borden County in the Coahoma Invitational Tournament.

Tuesday night, however, the Lady Panthers were sluggish through the first three minutes of the first quarter and that proved to be the difference.

E’stlyn Reed opened the scoring for the Lady Rebels with a driving layup and then Turner hit a 3-pointer and a 10-foot jumper back-to-back for a quick 7-0 lead with 5:52 left in the first quarter.

Permian countered with five unanswered points on an April Williams’ rebound and put back, followed by a long-distance jumper to the left of the key by Dusty Westlund that brought the Lady Panthers within two, 7-5, but that was as close as they would get the rest of the game.

Tascosa, behind Turner’s end-to-end play, went on an 11-4 run to the end of the quarter for a 20-9 lead after eight minutes. Brown started the run with a layup and then Turner hit her second 3-pointer of the game from the right corner to extend the lead to nine (14-5) with 3:02 left in the first quarter.

“I’m happy with the way that we competed tonight,” Permian coach Angela Braziel said. “We had to play catch up from the start and that takes a lot out of you and we never were able to catch up.

“I thought that after the first quarter we did a good job. I had to take April and run a box-and-1 on their top scorer (Tuner) and I thought that April did a great job on defense.”

Williams, a sophomore, hounded Turner all over the court the final three quarters and it showed on the stat sheet. After her first-quarter outburt, Williams held Turner to six points the rest of the way.

Courtney, though, was happy to see the quick start by Turner in the first quarter carry over to the rest of the game as the Lady Rebels held off several charges by the Lady Panthers.

“It was nice to see Kayla get going early because she had been struggling with her shot,” Courtney said. “This was a tough game and it’s a good win for us.”