WALDRON — For the better part of three quarters Wednesday night, Hauser was on its way to avenging its regular-season loss to Oldenburg Academy.
But in the final period, it slipped away. The Twisters used an 18-2 run from late in the third quarter until midway through the fourth to take control and went on to post a 62-50 win in the opening round of the Waldron girls basketball sectional.
The Jets, who fell to Oldenburg 44-30 on Jan. 14, jumped out to a 28-23 halftime lead in Wednesday’s rematch. The Twisters began the second half on an 11-4 run to take a 34-32 lead, but Hauser answered with an 8-2 run to go ahead 40-36 with 1:40 left in the third quarter before things started to take a turn for the worse.
“We’ve been working on trying to get off to a good start because we’ve been struggling pretty much all year, except the last three or four ballgames, of getting off to a good start,” Hauser coach Chad Evans said. “We finally did. A big thing for the girls, I wanted them to come out and just refuse to lose. That was the mentality all week — ‘Refuse to lose, and don’t back down from anything.”
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The 18-2 run left Oldenburg with a 54-42 lead with 4:10 remaining. The Jets got a 3-pointer from Bree Hadley to cut the lead to nine, but that was as close as they could come the rest of the way.
Kyliegh Parrott led Hauser (7-17) with 18 points. Hadley finished with 13 points, and Hannah Johnson added eight points and seven rebounds.
Harlee Masavage, who scored only 11 points against the Jets in their first meeting, led the Twisters (8-14) with 26 points and 10 rebounds. Katie Johnson added 14 points.
Hauser played without perhaps its best defensive player in senior guard Mel Hasler. Hasler sustained a concussion when she collided with Hadley in the fourth quarter of last week’s regular-season finale against Shelbyville.
“It hurt quite a bit because we could have rotated her and Marnie (Schwartzkopf) on (Johnson) and (Masavage) and try to contain them,” Evans said. “That would have been the biggest difference. It didn’t help that they were 18 of 26 from the free-throw line, and we were 6 of (10). That’s a big difference when you’re fouling all the time.”
Evans credited his three seniors with making his first year as Jets coach a pleasant one.
“They stepped up and played big today,” Evans said. “I hate to see them lose. I couldn’t ask for three better seniors. Shelby Fugate and Bree Hadley and Mel Hasler — those are three quality kids, and they’ll do bigger and better things after the game of basketball.”
