Third quarter woes lead to first loss for Bull Dogs

MARTINSVILLE — The Columbus North girls basketball team gained momentum and went on a 6-0 run to end the first half and put them into the lead.

At the start of the second half, all of that momentum quickly vanished.

Martinsville went on a 9-0 run to start the second half and outscored North 18-4 in the third quarter to hand the Bull Dogs their first loss of the season Friday 46-28.

“We had a lack of energy to start the third quarter,” North coach Pat McKee said. “We didn’t come out with the intensity that was required so we either didn’t get good shots or turned the ball over and they would beat us down the floor. We had a negative cycle that fueled itself and we struggled badly. Give Martinsville credit, they did a lot of good things. They covered our shooters and had people in the right places.”

[sc:text-divider text-divider-title=”Story continues below gallery” ]Click here to purchase photos from this gallery

A basket by Kylah Lawson and an Annie Anderson 3-pointer gave the Bull Dogs (1-1) an opening 5-0 lead. Later in the first quarter, with Martinsville leading 12-11, Sierra Norman stole the ball and would convert the layup in transition to lead 13-12 with 11 seconds left, but the Artesians converted two free throws to lead 14-13 after the first quarter.

Nadia Lomax scored the jumper for North to put them ahead 15-14. Martinsville scored the next six points to lead 20-15, until Tessa Lomax capped off a 6-0 run with a lay up at the buzzer to lead 21-20 at halftime.

The Bull Dogs trailed 38-24 heading into the fourth quarter. North couldn’t put together an offensive rally to counter the Artesian third quarter.

Anderson and Lawson each finished with seven points to lead the Bull Dogs.

North only has a short time to fix things as they host Southport in a huge early season Conference Indiana matchup Tuesday.

“We got to do a better job of playing game speed in practice,” McKee said. “Some of the misses in this game, they were reasonably open shots and shots we hit in practice, but in practice we are going 80-percent of the speed of the game. When we struggled on offense, I think we got frustrated and then our energy on defense waned as well.”