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Iota’s Cambri St. Andre pulls up for a shot over a defender Wednesday during the Lady Dogs’ 59-45 Class 3A semifinal loss to Parkview Baptist at the Univeristy Center in Hammond. St. Andre scored a team-high 20 points and had five rebounds, two assists and three steals in the loss.

Parkview edges Lady Dogs in semifinals

Chris Quebedeaux
Sports Editor
Crowley Post-Signal

The Iota Lady Bulldogs could not have picked a worse time to have a poor shooting night.
But that is what happened Thursday in their matchup with No. 4 seed Parkview Baptist in a Class 3A semifinal contest at Southeastern’s University Center.
The top-seeded Lady Dogs shot a tad under 30 percent from the floor on the night, knocking down just three of their 23 3-point attempts.
The result was a disappointing 59-45 loss to the Lady Eagles.
Parkview (24-10) now moves on to Saturday’s 6 p.m state title game against No. 2 seed Jewel Sumner, who defeated University 67-43, in the other semifinal contest.
Iota finished the season with a record of 24-10.
“We struggled offensively. We normally shoot the ball really well and we didn’t do that tonight,” said IHS coach Meghann LeJeune. “We just rushed everything and we couldn’t get in a rhythm.”
Making matters worse, the Lady Dogs struggled against Parkview’s size advantage inside and lost the rebounding battle, 40-29. Guards Leah Collins and Skyler Goodwin combined for 23 rebounds alone, including nine offensive boards.
“We knew coming in that we had to contain No. 11 (Goodwin) and we didn’t do a very good job of that,” said LeJeune of Parkview’s standout junior who poured in a game-high 31 points. “And we knew we had to keep their bigs off the boards.
“I think in the first half, that we did a terrible job of that. In the second half, we did a little bit better job of that, but by that time, we had too many of our go-to players in foul trouble and we were playing catchup after that.”
The Lady Dogs trailed by eight (36-28) after the third quarter but quickly trimmed that advantage to just two on a basket by Whitney Larry and back-to-back steals and layups by Becca Fantroy and Madeline Gatte to start the fourth quarter.
“I had five of my girls playing basketball,” said LeJeune of the quick turnaround.. “We played in spurts. We had one player playing here and one player playing there, but when we made that run, all five of them were getting after it.”
The Lady Dogs’ momentum swing was brief, however.
The Lady Eagles answered Iota’s run with a 15-2 streak of their own to push their cushion to 51-36 with just over three minutes remaining.
It was the straw that broke the Lady Dogs’ backs.
“That was our chance right there to get back to the Iota team that we have been all season,” said Iota senior Cambri St. Andre. “We just didn’t have that fight that we have always had to pull it out.
“We came out scared, we didn’t shoot well and we just made some dumb decisions.”
St. Andre was one of the lone bright spots for the Lady Dogs. She finished the night with a team-high 20 points and also had five rebounds, two assists and three steals.
“Cambri is my lone senior and she played like a senior tonight,” said LeJeune. “ That was probably the best I’ve seen her play. She just kept working and without her, we probably wouldn’t have even been in the game.”
Gatte was the only other Lady Dog to score in double figures with 12 points while Landry had six. Fantroy followed with five points and Shydee Johnson had two.
The Lady Eagles were basically a two-player show with Goodwin and Collins combining for 51 points. Goodwins’ 31-point effort, which included 16 points in the fourth quarter, was tops on the day. She also had 10 rebounds, two assists and five steals. Collins added 20 points and pulled down 13 boards.
The Lady Dogs got off to a rough start, connecting on just three of their 10 shots from the floor in the first quarter.
That trend carried over into the second frame as the Lady Dogs finished the half shooting just 27 percent, resulting in a 25-18 deficit.
St. Andre hit a quick shot to start the second half, cutting the lead to 25-20, but the Lady Dogs still managed to knock down just four of their 20 shots from the floor in the frame.
Iota had it’s highest offensive output in the final frame as they knocked down six of their 13 shots but it wasn’t enough as they were outscored 23-17 in the final eight minutes.

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