Lady Tigers drop three games during last week's season debut

The Mountain Home Lady Tigers are still looking for their first win of the girls basketball season after dropping their first three games last week. The Lady Tigers lost to 5A opponents Boise and Borah and dropped a heartbreaker to Gooding.

Boise 67, Mountain Home 35

Mountain Home started slow against Boise last week and was never able to make a concerted run in their 67-35 loss.

Boise jumped out to a 15-4 first quarter lead and stretched it to 39-18 at the half. It was 58-29, Boise, heading into the fourth.

For their first effort of the season, Mountain Home Lady Tiger basketball coach Brent Keener was able to see some positives.

"I thought the effort was pretty good. We faced a very good team, possibly the toughest opponent we will see," he said. "We've got to do a better job staying out of foul trouble in the future. Boise is a really tough matchup for us because of their size, so I'm glad to get that game out of the way."

Sable Lohmeier led Mountain Home with 13 points and five rebounds. Whitney Sandberg added nine points, Mattie Bennett chipped in seven, Alexis Juarez had five and Melissa Jessup scored one.

Borah 53, Mountain Home 30

An inability to get shots to fall hurt the Lady Tigers Thursday night in their home opener against Borah, as they lost to the Lady Lions 53-30.

Mountain Home took an early 3-0 lead on a basket by Sable Lohmeier and a free throw by Mattie Bennett before the Lady Lions scored six straight points. Claire Grindle's trey tied the game at 6-6, before Borah ran off seven straight points. Mattie Bennett's two free throws made it 13-8, Borah, after a quarter.

Borah's two freshmen, Alyssa Bolt and Alisia Jones, took over in the second quarter, combining for 14 of their 19 points in the quarter, as the Lady Lions extended their lead to 32-15, at the half.

Mountain Home's shooting woes continued in the third quarter, as they managed just one field goal and two free throws in the period, during which the Lady Lions stretched their lead to 45-19.

Borah increased its lead to 51-21 in the first minute of the fourth quarter, before Whitney Sandberg scored six of her seven points in the fourth quarter, and Melissa Jessup scored all five of hers in the quarter as the Lady Tigers battled back to make it a 53-30 final.

Coach Keener thought the game was much closer than the score indicated, and had some shots dropped, could have been much closer.

"Offensively, I thought we honestly got some good looks at the basket, we just couldn't finish them. I think part of that's fatigue. I thought Mattie had some great looks and couldn't finish them, shots that she normally finishes, and the same with Whitney. I think Sable, when she got in foul trouble, that kind of took her out of the game a little bit, but overall, I didn't think it was necessarily a blowout, even though the scoreboard may have said that, but if we make half of those easy shots, we're right in that game."

Mattie Bennett led the Lady Tigers in scoring with eight points, Whitney Sandberg added seven, Melissa Jessup scored five, Sable Lohmeier added four and brought down five rebounds to lead in that category. Claire Grindle netted three, Alexis Juarez two and Jacey Carr one.

Gooding 52, Mountain Home 51

Mountain Home grabbed the lead with 30 seconds left, but couldn't hang on to it, losing to the Lady Senators from Gooding, 52-51, Friday night during Orange Out Night in Lloyd Schiller Gymnasium.

The Orange Out contest had six lead changes and five ties -- most of those in the first quarter. Mountain Home's first lead was 6-4, and again at 8-6, before the Lady Senators went on a 12-0 run to up their lead to 18-8 with 6:29 left in the first half.

Mattie Bennett scored 10 of her game-high 13 points in the second quarter, as the Lady Tigers clawed their way back into the ball game, taking a 25-24 lead on Elisabeth Ryan's three-pointer with seven seconds left in the half.

Gooding then converted two free throws with five seconds left to take a 26-25 lead into the locker room at halftime.

Between turnovers and missed shots, Mountain Home saw Gooding up its lead to 34-25. The Lady Tigers didn't score until Taylor Reed's basket with 59 seconds left in the quarter. Melissa Jessup added a trey 30 seconds later, before the Lady Senators added two free throws to take a 36-30 lead into the fourth quarter.

Mountain Home quickly fell back by 10 points again, 40-30, in the first minute of the fourth.

Whitney Sandberg then caught fire, scoring 10 points in the quarter, as the Lady Tigers battled back to tie the game at 45-45 and again at 50-50.

Mattie Bennett then sank one of two free throws with 30 seconds left to put the Lady Tigers up, 51-50.

Gooding hit two free throws with 25.1 seconds left to put the Lady Senators back ahead, 52-51.

Mountain Home came down the court, shot and missed, and Gooding did the same at their end, so Mountain Home again had the ball, trying for the last shot, but turned the ball over with 3.9 seconds left.

An intentional foul put Gooding at the line, where they missed both shots but also got the ball out of bounds. They were fouled on the inbounds play, and missed two more free throws with 3.3 seconds left.

Mountain Home got the ball down in time to put up a three-pointer, but it hit the backboard and did not go down for them, as the Lady Senators escaped with a 52-51 win.

"I'm obviously disappointed we lost, but was encouraged with the fourth quarter," said Coach Keener. "We've got to have some girls step up and play better for us to have some success, and be more consistent with their play. The game did provide us some great situational stuff that is hard to duplicate in practice"

Mattie Bennett led Mountain Home with 13 points, 12 of them in the first half and 10 in the second quarter. Melissa Jessup added 12 points before fouling out in the fourth quarter. Whitney Sandberg scored 10 points, all coming in the fourth quarter. Sable Lohmeier had seven points and seven rebounds. Elisabeth Ryan scored five points and Alexis Juarez and Taylor Reed both added two.

Mountain Home shot just 23 percent (15/66) from the field, including five of 27 three-point attempts (19 percent). They hit 70 percent (16/23) of their free throws.

Gooding shot just 25 percent (15/61) from the field, hitting just one of six (17 percent) long balls. They went to the free throw line 15 more times (38) and converted 21 for 55 percent.

Mountain Home traveled to Kimberly this Tuesday to face the 3A Lady Bulldogs in non-conference play. Their next action is next Tuesday when they travel to Jerome.