By David Knox
The Clay-Chalkville girls used the buddy system to knock off the Fort Payne Lady Wildcats in the first round of the New Year’s Shootout at Bryant Bank Arena at Hewitt-Trussville High on Saturday.
In the first quarter, it was Raven Omar. In the fourth quarter, it was Alex Johnson.
Clay-Chalkville junior Raven Omar shooting in the New Year’s Shootout in Bryant Bank Arena. photo by Ron Burkett
“They’re great buddies,” coach Justin Haynie said of the junior teammates after the Lady Cougars’ 50-39 win. “They’ve played on the same AAU team and they play great together.”
The Lady Cougars (7-5) started slowly offensively as Fort Payne built a 12-4 lead. Then Omar, a junior point guard, took over. In the final two minutes of the quarter, she drilled a 3-pointer, followed by an old-fashioned three-point play, and then nailed another trey to give Clay a 13-12 lead after one period. “She really caught fire and gave us the momentum going into the second quarter,” Haynie said.
Fort Payne used its strength inside to battle back, as Nykeia McElrath and Reese Stiefel scored nine of Fort Payne’s 11 second-period points to battle back to a 23-23 tie at intermission. Omar was shut out in the quarter, but senior Summer Pettway picked up the slack by scoring six of her 11 total points in the quarter.
The Lady Wildcats continued to pound it inside in the third quarter, but a nice dish from Omar to Johnson pushed the lead to 29-25. But Johnson was quickly whistled for her third foul. That was Clay’s last field goal of the quarter, but Pettway made 3-of-4 free throws and the Lady Cougars’ aggressive defense held Scottsboro to just eight points in the quarter – half of them by Stiefel — as Clay took a 34-31 lead into the final quarter.
But Stiefel picked up her fourth foul, and Johnson got rolling. After a Stiefel basket cut the score to 34-33, Johnson scored six straight points to push the margin to 40-33. After a McElrath bucket, Johnson answered with another hoop. The Lady Cougars shot out to a 46-37 lead on a Pettway basket on a fastbreak and Omar made a pretty assist to Johnson for another hoop at 1:40 that gave Clay a 48-39 lead.
Omar finished it off with a pair of free throws second later and the final 50-39 margin.
“When (Stiefel) got in foul trouble, we wanted to take it inside to Alex,” Haynie said. “We felt we could either foul her out or get her to back off.
“We let a lead slip away to this team in the regionals (last season) and we really wanted to finish it off.”
Omar finished with 15 points, Johnson added 12 and Pettway tallied 11. For Fort Payne, Stiefel had 17 and McElrath scored 16.
The Lady Cougars will next face Huffman, a 44-34 winner over Gadsden City, at 2:30 Monday afternoon.
