Playing for a chance to finish in a tie for second place in the final District 6-4A standings, the Brownwood Lady Lions carried a four-point lead into the halftime locker room Tuesday night. But the No. 25 Brock Lady Eagles dominated the second half, scoring 20 of the first 22 points in the third period en route to a 66-46 victory at Warren Gym in the regular season finale.
“To win ball games you have to put four quarters together and we put two together and then came out after halftime and disappeared,” said Lady Lions head coach Heather Hohertz. “We did absolutely everything we could do wrong to start the third quarter and that was the difference in the game.”
With the loss, the Lady Lions (23-11, 5-5) will settle the No. 2 seed out of District 6 in the Class 4A Division I playoffs, behind Stephenville (17-16, 6-4). No. 3 Glen Rose (32-2, 10-0) and Brock (22-9, 7-3) will represent the district in 4A Division II.
Brownwood will face District 5 co-champion Levelland (19-5, 8-2) at 5 p.m. Monday at Colorado City to begin its postseason run, seeking the program’s first bi-district title since 2018.
“We’ll start putting the game plan in tomorrow and we’ll have Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to work on that, and try to fine tune some things and go win a bi-district championship on Monday,” Hohertz said.
The Lady Lions built a 32-28 halftime lead behind six three-pointers over the first two periods, including five from Trinity Roberts who scored 19 of her game-high 21 points before intermission.
“Trinity played well on both sides of the floor,” Hohertz said. “But we have to have all five people on the floor and all 11 on the team together playing defense and executing.”
In the second half, Brock’s Keira Mathews took over and scored the first 10 points after the break – and finished with 20 for the game – aided by seven Lady Lions turnovers in the third period alone after committing only five the entire first half.
Laney Hudson added 15 points for Brock and Savannah Hatcher also finished in double figures with 12 points.
Icess Hall tacked on seven points for Brownwood, Hannah Deen and Nylah Hall chipped in six each, Jade Morin finished with four, and Cassidy Brown sank a pair of free throws, but the Lady Lions struggled to establish any offensive consistency after halftime.
“We had too many turnovers after halftime,” Hohertz said. “They were able to chase down loose balls and went and got layups, and we weren’t able to get our defense set.”
Tuesday’s game marked the final at Warren Gym for Lady Lion seniors Kate Tindol, Miranda Northcutt, Adyson Neel, Rylie Schafer, and Cassidy Brown, as well as manager Talia Craff.
“They’ve been here a long time and I’ve watched them move up since they were sixth graders,” Hohertz said. “They’ve meant a lot to the program. You always want to leave a place better than you found it and this class helped us out of a rut we were in there for a few years. I’m proud of the hard work and dedication they put into the program for four years.”
