Loss ends Lady Tigers' post season

The basketball post season ended last Monday for the Mountain Home Lady Tigers with their 55-19 district tournament loss to Caldwell.

The score was somewhat misleading, because the Lady Tigers played hard all night, forcing the same number of turnovers from Caldwell that they had -- 24. But a frigid night of shooting plagued Mountain Home as the team hit just six field goals on the night while shooting just 12 percent from the field.

Mountain Home girls basketball coach Brent Keener thought his girls once again played tough but just could not get many shots to fall in their favor.

"It makes it really tough when you can't shoot the ball -- it's really hard," the coach said. "Caldwell shot the ball really well in the first half, and that kind of deflated us. We did pretty well containing the big girls inside... but they shot 'lights out' outside."

Whitney Sandberg led Mountain Home in scoring with nine points. Julia Burton added six, Missy Jessup dropped in three and Alexis Juarez finished with one.

Mountain Home's 12 percent shooting included just two of 21 three-point shots. The Lady Tigers also shot poorly from the free throw line, hitting just five of 20 for 25 percent.

In comparison, Caldwell hit 41 percent of its shots, including a sizzling 50 percent of its three-balls. The team shot just 44 percent from the foul line.

The Lady Tigers lose five seniors from this year's club that went 0-23 on the season. However, Coach Keener believes the future looks bright for Lady Tigers basketball.

"We've got an eighth grade class coming up that's really solid," the coach said. They're going to push some of these high school kids. Hopefully, we're willing to commit to the off-season, because obviously, as a whole, we've got a lot of work to do. So hopefully, we're willing to do it."