Published: February 22, 2007 12:22 pm      

Lady Panthers are District 4AA Tournament champions

A large contingent from Cumberland County made their way eastward on I-40 to watch the Stone Memorial Lady Panthers vie with the Loudon Lady Redskins for the 4AA crown and the fans were rewarded with perhaps the top output of the season from Coach Tim Smith’s squad, who posted a 72-61 victory.

Stone jumped out to an early lead in the first period as each of the starting five entered the scoring column with Erica Martin leading the way with seven first-quarter points on the way to a 20-5 lead.

This was a game of ups and downs as the Loudon girls came back in the second period to pull within four points at halftime at 30-26. Faced with full-court pressure for most of the game the Stone girls never backed off and kept running the floor on offense keeping the pace of the game up-tempo.

The teams matched point output in the third quarter and the Lady Panthers entered the final quarter leading 45-41 as they sought a district title in their first season.

The Lady Panthers outscored the Lady Redskins by 27-20 in the final period behind three three-pointers from Erica Martin and another from Lindsay Smith. Each time the Loudon team would try to close the gap the Lady Panthers would counter with a trey or a steal. Chelsey Brown stole the ball twice from the Loudon point guard late in the contest and each time converted the steal into a layup.

Outstanding ball handling down the stretch by Smith and Brown had the Lady Redskins in the position of having to foul and Brown made eight of nine with Martin adding four more for the final margin of 72-61.

Destiny Dishman played another hard-nosed game under the boards, also scoring eight points in the Stone win. Krystal Henry, the other Lady Panther starter also made a significant contribution under the boards and with stellar defense as did reserves Brittany Eller, Leslie Brown, Tiffany Norris and Caitlin Sanders.

In the eyes of the Stone Memorial fans all the girls deserved all-tourney honors but that wasn’t possible. As it was, Martin and Smith made the all-tournament team and Brown was named the tournament MVP.

Martin was the Lady Panther scoring leader with 22 points and she was joined in double figures by Brown with 19 and Smith with 18. Dishman totaled eight, Henry and Leslie Brown two each and Norris one.

Coach Tim Smith commented,” I couldn’t have asked for much more. We had a good game plan, the girls bought into it and executed well. We shot well when we had to.”

He added, "We wanted to make them beat us from the outside and although they made 11 threes they also missed 20. Our defense kept them out there.”

Also, Tyler Crowder and Taylor Kiser were named to the boys' All-Tournament team.

Stone’s girls will now play host to Gibbs tonight at 6, while the Panthers will play at Austin-East Saturday at 7 p.m. EST.