IOTA -- It’s like trying to climb a mountain to begin with when the Mamou Lady Demons took to the road to take on perennial powerhouse Iota in the first round of the Class 3A LHSAA playoffs here Thursday night, especially when the Lady Demon’s best player, Kazhanna Richard, never even saw the floor the entire night.
On top of that, the two teams are district opponents and had played each other twice this season, with the Lady Bulldogs coming away with two wins by an average margin of victory of 30 points.
Unfortunately, that mountain became Everest, as Iota took down Mamou 58-20, knocking the Lady Demons out of the playoffs.
“Tonight we were without one of our best players because of personal things team wise,” stated Mamou head coach Deneshia Allsion after the contest. “That really threw off the rest of the team. The first two quarters, they really were not sure of themselves without her on the floor. But, I was extremely proud of how we responded after the first half.”
“I thought we came out in the second half and gave a great effort,” Allison continue. “Iota has a great team and did an excellent job of shooting the ball. You have to give it to them, they are a seasoned team.”
Things did not start well for the Lady Demons, both offensively and defensively. The Lady Bulldogs owned the first quarter with a capital “O”, scoring the first 25 points of the game.
With one minute left in the opening period, the Lady Demons finally got on the board with a basket from Braylin Charles. Iota rounded out the scoring in the quarter on a bucket with 51 seconds left on the clock.
The second quarter began the same way as the first, with the Lady Bulldogs reeling off the first six points. However, Mamou was able to collect some offense earlier than they had in the opening period, getting another bucket with 2:59 left before half.
By the time the dust had settled in the quarter, Iota held a 40-7 lead, as the teams headed into the locker room.
The Lady Demons came out of halftime with some renewed energy on both sides of the floor. Mamou held the Lady Bulldogs to only 10 points in the third quarter and out matched their entire first half scoring performance at the same time.
When the buzzer sounded to end the period, the score was 50-15 in favor of the Lady Bulldogs.
The final quarter did not see much in the way of offense from both teams, as Iota out scored Mamou 8-5 to close out the game.
Unjel Lazard put up seven points to lead the Lady Demons.
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TRACEY JAGNEAUX