You could forgive the Lady Tiders for starting slow coming off the biggest game of the year against Benton last week.
On Tuesday night at Huntington, Minden got a 61-45 win in spite of exhibiting familiar problems in their game.
“The first half wasn’t our best basketball,” Minden head coach Jacob Brown said. “We did play hard, but we should have been up way more than we were.”
The Lady Tiders held Huntington to just three points in the first quarter and led 27-17 heading into halftime.
The Lady Raiders went on a 13–0 run in the third quarter to take a 30-29 lead. During the stretch, Brown said he refused to call a timeout because he wanted to see some resolve from his team.
“We have six seniors on this team,” Brown said. “I let them play through it.”
Minden began to get after Huntington on defense shortly after and went on an 8-0 run of their own to take back the lead.
The Lady Tiders struggled from the free-throw line on Tuesday night, going just 13-33 from the stripe.
“Every day it’s the first thing we do in practice is shoot free throws,” Brown said. “I wouldn’t gripe about it if I didn’t believe we could do better. We’re not going to get to where we want to be as a team if we miss twenty free throws in a district game on the road.”
Minden exploded for 19 points in the fourth as Destini Powell hit two three-point bombs to continue her excellent shooting streak. The Lady Tiders executed in the half court in the fourth quarter to see out the win.
“Good defensive teams don’t let you score off the first pass,” Brown said. “I think we get a little impatient sometimes, but tonight we ran our sets really well in the fourth.”
Derrica Gilbert led Minden with 17 points. Janiya Reed had 15, and Powell scored 13.
Tayler Banks had 12 points as Minden once again had four girls score in double-figures.
Minden (22-3, 6-1) will host North DeSoto on Friday night at 6 p.m. at The Palace.
