Belgreen girls’ basketball team wins one of two game at Haleyville tourney

The Belgreen High School varsity girls’ basketball team won one and lost one in its two games at a post-Christmas tournament hosted by Haleyville High School December 26-28.

On December 26th, the Lady Bulldogs rolled past Carbon Hill 71-30 before suffering just the team’s fourth defeat of the season against Danville on December 28th, 64-56.

Belgreen had no problem dispatching the Lady Bulldogs of Carbon Hill to start the tourney. BHS jumped out to a 21-2 lead after the opening eight minutes, and then added another 20 points in the second quarter to take a 41-16 advantage into the halftime break.

Led by senior Dacota Green, who scored 11 of her 18 total points the first half, continued to dominate in the second half. BHS doubled Carbon Hill’s nine points in the third quarter and then outscored CBHS 12-5 in the final period of play.

“Against Carbon Hill, we played well,” Belgreen head coach Chad Green said. “I think everyone scored in that game.”

Next to Dacota Green’s 18 points, Belgreen’s Lilliana Willingham added 12 points and Bryn Scott scored eight points in the win, the 14th of the season for the Lady Bulldogs. 

Belgreen’s runaway success against Carbon Hill, however, didn’t—in terms of the result—carry over to its next game against the Danville Lady Hawks a couple days later, as the Lady Bulldogs fell to one of the top teams in Class 4A by eight points.

“Danville is a good team,” Green said. “They’re the No. 10-ranked 4A team, so it was good for us. They had a couple of good players that definitely hurt us.

“We scored well—we scored 56 points—but we just gave us too much defensively,” the head coach added.

The two squads traded blows throughout the contest, with Belgreen taking an initial two-point lead after the first period. Danville regrouped in the second quarter and outscored the Lady Bulldogs 18-10 to take a 31-25 advantage into the break.

Belgreen once again came out strong to start the next period, outpacing Danville 18-16 in the third, but it wasn’t enough for the Lady Bulldogs to retake the lead. The Lady Hawks 17-13 run in the fourth to close the game out and hand Belgreen its fourth defeat of the campaign—all of which have come against schools in Class 4A or higher.

“We wanted to beef up the competition this year,” Green said. “Last year we had a good year in Class 1A. We went to the region finals, one game away from Birmingham. We knew we were stepping up to 2A, so thought we needed to make our schedule a little bit tougher, and we have.

“We’ve done well,” he added. “Every coach wants to be undefeated, but I’m proud of my team. I’ll be honest, from last year to this year, offensive-wise, we’re better than we were last year. But defensive-wise, I don’t think we’re quite where we were last year, but hopefully we get there before the year ends.”

Makenna Fisher was the Lady Bulldogs’ top scorer in the defeat, dropping 18 points. Randi Terry added a season-high 12 points and Bryn Scott scored 10 points.

“Makenna Fisher had a good game,” Green said.

“Randi came in in that game against Danville and had 12 big points for us. She rebounds, she’s a good on-the-ball defender, so she’s definitely been a great addition to our team,” Green added. “Bryn has always been a good ball-handler and on-the-ball defender, but she’s starting to score more this year and we’re really pleased with that.”

Belgreen had an opportunity to avenge the loss to Danville soon after, as the Lady Bulldogs took on the Lady Hawks again in their next game on January 2nd. BHS knocked off Danville 55-51 at Wallace State Community College. Fisher led the Lady Bulldogs with 15 points while Terry scored 14 and Willingham added 13 points.

Most recently, Belgreen traveled to Hackleburg and took down the Lady Panthers 46-37 to improve to 16-4 overall. Fisher once again led her team with 13 points in the victory.