The Airline Lady Vikings, Benton Lady Tigers and Parkway Lady Panthers won high school girls basketball season openers Tuesday night.
Airline defeated Northwood 55-35 at Northwood in Lyndzee Greene McConathy’s debut as head coach. Benton downed Haughton 72-44 at Haughton. Parkway knocked off Lakeview 65-56 at Lakeview.
The Bossier Lady Kats lost a tough 35-34 overtime decision to Southwood at Southwood.
At Northwood, LaDayjah Means led a balanced Airline scoring attack with 11 points, including two 3-pointers. Makayla Bendaw scored nine points, including a pair of 3s, and grabbed seven rebounds. Taaliyah Johnson chipped in with eight points, and Trinity Robinson had seven.
Kei McCoy had nine steals, four assists and five rebounds. Jhnaudika Cook had 10 rebounds and Samone Thomas six. Brooklyn Sutton contributed to the victory with four steals.
The Lady Vikings led 28-12 at the half and 44-24 going into the final quarter.
At Haughton, Benton had three players in double figures in the victory. Emily Ward, the MVP on The Press Tribune’s All-Parish team last season, started her junior season with a 20-point game.
Sophomore Qua Chambers added 17 and freshman Jada Anderson 13. Anderson knocked down three 3-pointers.
Claire Ambrose and Abbie Wynn scored eight each.
Champagne Dennis and Taralyn Sweeney led Haughton with 16 and 15 points, respectively. Keeana Barber hit two 3-pointers and scored nine points.
At Southwood, Destiny Thomas scored 12 points and pulled down 14 rebounds in Bossier’s close loss. Chloe Walker added 11 points, and Dranautika Thomas had 12 rebounds.
The game was close all the way. Southwood led 7-6 after the first quarter, but the Lady Kats outscored the Lady Cowboys 14-9 in the second for a 20-16 halftime lead.
Bossier only scored four points in the third quarter but trailed only 25-24 going into the fourth. The game went into overtime tied at 31.
— Russell Hedges, rhedges@bossierpress.com
