By Angie Ledbetter
The South Panola Lady Tiger’s basketball team dominated the Cleveland Tournament last week returning home with the championship trophy.

Monday night the Lady Tigers opened the tournament slamming Ray Brooks 73-37 to advance to the second round where they took on Greenville St Joe. The second game wasn’t a problem for the Lady Tigers as they won hands down 54-13 to make it to the championship round against hometown Cleveland.

Only 18 points divided the championship game which was the closest for the Lady Tigers in the tournament as they won 62-44.

Senior point guard Christa Brown was the difference maker in all three games scoring a total of 99 points.

“Christa had an unbelievable tournament,” said Lady Tiger head coach Ralph Stallings. “I think she averaged about 33 points a game. Right now she’s just putting the load on her shoulders. We also got some help from Crystal Contreras and Chresha Brown also so it’s not just all of the pressure on Christa to do the scoring. If I can get all five to do that then we’ll really be dangerous.”
Christa Brown started the tournament scoring 42 points in the Ray Brooks game while senior post Contreras added 16.

The Lady Tigers were up 24-2 at the end of the first quarter.

“St. Joe was a little under manned but the bench came in and did a good job so overall I was pleased. They stepped up and lead in scoring for two and a half quarters they played. That gave me some valuable minutes for some of them that haven’t got to play a good bit.”

In the championship game Christa Brown scored 37 points and Chresha Brown added 15. The Lady Tigers were seven of 12 from the free throw line for the last game.

Stallings said the team had three really good games.

“We’re not playing a lot of people. The last game we only played six but they used the speed and quickness they have almost to perfection. Cleveland had no answer for it all night because they had never seen a team with that much quickness.”

Stallings said the Lady Tigers still aren’t anyway where they need to be.

“We made a ton of mistakes in the Cleveland game and missed some easy shots but did a better job on defense.”

The Lady Tigers will play their first home game of the season Thursday night when they host Cleveland for a rematch battle. The next night they’ll host Water Valley and finish play before the holiday season on December 13 hosting Horn Lake.