'Cat Attack

BROOKSVILLE - Hernando High traveled across town to visit the Hernando Christian Academy Lady Lions Friday night and left with a convincing victory, 71-43.
Hernando's center, April Griffey, led all scorers with 28 points, along with six rebounds and a steal.
Hernando (13-4) proved it was in control from the opening tip. On the first missed shot, Desirae Woods grabbed the offensive rebound and put it back in. Hernando never looked back.
The Lady Leopards stormed out to a 19-8 first-quarter lead getting six points each from three starters, Jasmire Brown, Griffey and Woods.
The trio that combined for 22 rebounds also outscored HCA, 47-43.
HCA simply had no answer for them.
With 3:33 left in the first quarter, Brown fed Griffey for two points, and 1:17 later Brown kept it for herself, driving the lane scoring two of her 12 on the night, 33-15 Leopards.
Defensively, the Leopards were a team on a mission, playing a swarming defense, forcing HCA into 34 turnovers.
Trying to spark her team early in the third quarter, HCA's Danielle Kuka drove the lane with 6:58 remaining for two of her 11 points on the night.
With 4:22 left in the third quarter, Brown found Griffey in the paint, Griffey hit the shot and was fouled, and she completed the three-point play.
With 2:43 in the quarter, the Lions' Heidi Riley drove left and hit for two of her four points, 58-30.
With the game out of reach, the two teams played pretty even the fourth quarter with Hernando out-scoring the Lions by only two points.
"I think we left 15 or 20 points on the floor, just by missing lay-ups and free throws," explained HCA Head Coach Jim Bragg. "That's the first public school we really played. I thought we would do a little better than we did. Hernando's not too bad. They were moving the ball around very well and April is a force too. She's wicked on the boards.
"Hernando was a lot quicker than I thought they were," added Bragg. "I had to come out of my press 'cause we couldn't stop them. This was a good experience for us. I hope this helps us in the districts and we go farther down."
"There was so much hype about this game," shared Hernando High's first-year Head Coach Josandra Maner, a HHS graduate. "I wasn't really worried about it because I know they play smaller schools. I knew they planned to press us but they took that off after about a minute because we practice the press all the time. The press is the easiest thing to break. We jumped out ahead just off of that. We were wide open for easy lay-ups. We had Desirae wide open every time.
"They came and watched us last night," added Maner. "They were in the stands shouting out to us, and getting my girls real hyped. So they came here wanting to play and ready to beat them. We passed the ball real good. We did a good job making our lay-ups. We were a lot better on free throws. Tonight they were ready to play."

Hernando 71, HCA 43
Qtr. Scoring 1 2 3 4
HER 19 14 25 13 -- 71
HCA 8 7 13 15 -- 43
HERNANDO (71) - Ledington 0, Jenkins 3 2-3 8, Brown 5 1-2 12, Griffey 11 6-8 28, Woods 3 1-4 7, Lawrence 1 0-2 2, Haines 3 0-0 6, DeRamus 2 2-5 6, Dixon 0 0-2 0, Blount 0, Geiger 1 0-1 2. Totals 29 12-27 71.
HCA (43) - Manuel 2 1-4 5, Riley 1 2-5 4, Kuka 3 4-8 11, 0 Armstrong 0 1-5 1, Flowers 4 0-0 8, Langley 0 0-1 0, Hanshaw 2 1-2 7, Allen 2 3-8 7. Totals 14 12-33 43.
3-point field goals - HER: 1 (Brown), HCA 3 (Kuka 1, Me. Hanshaw 2).
Total fouls - HER: 25; HCA 22.
Fouled out -- Riley, Ma Hanshaw (HCA).
Technicals -- Bragg (HCA).
Records - Hernando (13-4), Hernando Christian Academy (11-4).