Lady Leopards dominate Hobbton once more

Monday night’s late game at Lakewoo saw the Lady Leopards battle the Hobbton Lady Wildcats in the first round of the Carolina 1A conference tournament, marking the third meeting of the two teams for the year, with Lakewood taking both of the previous games in dominating fashion. That was the case once more as the Leopards took the 60-17 win in front of their hometown crowd.

Hobbton’s Cassie Driver and Lakewood’s Jahmai Rich faced off for the opening tip. Rich was able to get it to A’miyah Smith, who got it to Areona McKoy for a basket just seconds into the game. McKoy would grab a steal and get another basket, and a Kiyah Braxton steal would get Rich on the board via a Smith assist. Less than a minute into the game, Lakewood had the 6-0 lead. Rich would extend it 8-0 on a pass from McKoy.

The Wildcats couldn’t get anything working in their favor, as the Lakewood defense gave them fits early and often. Miley McLamb was no good on two jumpers, grabbing her own rebound on the first attempt, unable to get it home. McKoy had the 3-point play for the Leopards to make it a 13-0 for the hosts not even three minutes into the contest.

Katie Britt fired a 3 for the visitors but was also off the mark as their offensive struggles continued. McKoy grabbed another Wildcat pass and took it down the court to assist Braxton on a fast-break layup to push their lead to 15-0.

A 3 from Izzy Hepworth finally got Hobbton on the board just north of a minute left in the first period to make it a 17-3 lead for Lakewood.

A 20-3 advantage came Lakewood’s way after Alexis Rhodes completed a 3-point play on a layup and foul shot, which would be the first quarter score.

Neither team could find their footing to start the second quarter, with empty possessions falling to both squads. Takiyah Carr would grab a triple over a minute in, extending Lakewood’s lead to 23-3.

Graci Barefoot made a layup through contact, plus she sank the ensuing foul shot to give the Wildcats a 3-point play of their own.

Scoring slowed down for Lakewood, as the hosts looked to slow down their offensive approach in general. A pair of free throws were good from Rich, and a foul shot from McKoy extended it to 26-6 with under five minutes left in the half.

While Lakewood had purposely slowed its offense down, Hobbton just couldn’t get any offense going, by way of bad shots and a Leopard defense showing no reprieve.

The score climbed to 29-6 in favor of Lakewood with just over a minute to play in the half, as the Leopards were quickly encroaching on the running clock threshold. Rhodes gave the Leopards a point on a free throw and Rich added a put-back layup. Katie Britt snagged a deep two for the Wildcats just before the halftime break, with a 32-8 Lakewood lead showing.

Rhodes opened up scoring for both teams just six seconds into the third on a foul shot to make it 33-8. McKoy took a hand to the face with 6:47 to play in the third, causing a brief pause in action and sidelining the freshman guard for a period of time. Trinity Bell connected with Braxton on the inbound pass following, which netted Lakewood two more. The duo would be back to work on the next possession in a similar scenario, this time with Braxton getting a deep two.

An elbow jumper from Bell after a free throw from Rhodes extended Lakewood’s lead to 42-8 with 5:14 left in the third quarter.

Not only was Hobbton struggling at both ends of the court, but the Wildcats picked up their fifth foul not even halfway into the period. With the 37-point lead and under three minutes left in the quarter, Lakewood was looking to get the 40th point in their lead to enact a running clock. Hobbton’s Madison Sinclair inched them further from that, though, as she sank a flat-footed triple to make it a 45-11 game south of 3:30. Aubree McLamb did the same, this time making it 47-14.

Karima Freeman connected with Braxton to give her another long two, extending the lead once again to 37. Braxton hit another on Lakewood’s next possession, making it a 53-14 lead for Lakewood and forcing a Hobbton timeout with 28.9 seconds left in the third — just one point shy of the mercy rule threshold. But, before the Leopards could reach that, Izzy Hepworth banked in a 3 of her own to close it to a 53-17 lead with just seconds left in the third period.

The score would move to 56-17 to end the third.

Both teams lost traction scoring to start the fourth, as Lakewood was trying to start the running clock and get the game over with, and the Wildcats were looking to claw their way back into it. A put-back by Rich eclipsed the 40th point for the hosts barely north of six minutes, making it a 58-17 lead.

Sloppy basketball befell both teams with turnovers from each of the conference foes lighting up the box score late in the game. The running clock was on, though, so the only thing to be decided from this point was the winning margin by Lakewood.

The Leopards would take the 60-17 win.

Lakewood was set to take on Neuse Charter at North Duplin Tuesday night, a conference rival who the Lady Leopards have split their season series with. On facing off with the Cougars again, head coach Lofton Kerr knew his team was in for a tough game.

“Gotta be ready,” the longtime Leopard coach said. “They came out here and handled us pretty good, but we beat them at their place, so we’ve got to play better than we did starting out … we gotta play with more intensity.”

Lakewood moved to 17-3 on the season and into the second round of Carolina 1A conference tournament action, looking to take the conference and get a better playoff seed. Hobbton’s season was likely done with the loss, giving them a 1-17 record.