Despite district rebound, Lady Tigers come up short

The Mountain Home Lady Tigers bounced back from their opening round district tournament loss to Skyview with an impressive win over Caldwell, but came up short against Nampa to be eliminated from the tourney.

Mountain Home 41, Caldwell 24

The Mountain Home Lady Tigers kept their basketball season going last Tuesday night by ousting Caldwell from the District III 4A girls basketball tourney with a 41-24 win in Mountain Home.

A 8-0 run midway through the first quarter helped spark the Lady Tigers to a 17-5 first quarter lead.

Mountain Home scored only five points in the second quarter, but held Caldwell to just four, as they went up 22-9 at halftime.

Mountain Home stretched its lead in the third quarter and took a 31-16 lead into the fourth quarter. Caldwell managed to cut the lead to 34-24, with just under three minutes left, but the Lady Tigers went on a 7-0 run to end the ball game.

Mountain Home Lady Tiger basketball coach Brent Keener was happy to see his Lady Tigers come out strong from the start.

"That second quarter we had a little difficulty scoring, but after that first quarter, man, we really came out of the gate," he said.

Mattie Bennett led the Lady Tigers in scoring with a season-high 15 points. Jacci Cristobal and Tessa Pachner both added seven, Whitney Sandberg had five, Selena Foster four and Marissa Streeter three.

Mountain Home shot 42 percent from the field against Caldwell, despite hitting only two of 10 three-pointers. They converted 65 percent from the free-throw line.

Caldwell shot just 20 percent from the field, hitting two of seven shots beyond the arc and were only six of 13 from the foul line.

Nampa 48, Mountain Home 45

The Caldwell win put the Lady Tigers in the consolation semi-finals at Bishop Kelly against Nampa. Mountain Home led a good share of the ball game, but gave up the lead in the final two minutes and lost, 48-45, to end the team's season.

Mountain Home came out strong in the first quarter,and shot its way to a 14-7 first quarter lead. The team led 28-22 at the half.

Mountain Home saw the lead slip out of its hands in the middle part of the third quarter, but rallied to take a 43-39 lead into the fourth.

The Lady Tigers managed just two points in the fourth, as Nampa came back to take the lead, 46-45, with under two minutes left in the game. Mountain Home turned the ball over their next time down the floor and Nampa scored to push the lead to three points.

Jacci Cristobal put up a three-point attempt to tie the game at the buzzer, but the ball hit the rim and did not go in. The Lady Bulldogs escaped with a 48-45 win.

"She got a pretty good shot," said Coach Keener after the game of Cristobal's last-second try. "We didn't execute very well before that -- even after those timeouts -- we didn't get the looks we wanted, but that's the way it goes sometimes."

Selena Foster and Jacci Cristobal led the way with 16 and 10 points, respectively. Mattie Bennett finished with seven points, Madi Karst had five, Whitney Sandberg and Tessa Pachner both scored three and Marissa Streeter had one point.

Mountain Home shot 44 percent from the field, including six of 10 on treys. They hit just 50 percent from the free-throw line.

Nampa shot 35 percent from the field and hit 7 of 19 three-pointers, and, what was the difference in the game, hit 85 percent from the charity stripe. The loss ended the Lady Tigers season at 6-17.

Nampa went on to beat Skyview in double overtime to take third place in the district and advance to this week's state 4A tourney.