Shauna Cook
The Corsair
Friday, Feb. 9 was a victory in the semi-finals for the Lady Pirates winning against Palm Beach (overall 25-1) 79-52. The Lady Pirates will advance to the Championship game tomorrow evening playing against either Daytona (overall 15-14) who won against St. Petersburg yesterday or Gulf Coast (overall 23-4) who won against Broward yesterday. Tonight’s game at 8 p.m. between Daytona and Gulf Coast will determine who goes to the Championship with the Pensacola State Lady Pirates.
The starting line-up for the Lady Pirates was Sophomore from Natchitoches, La #3 Brandy Broome, Sophomore from Washington, DC #5 Ronika Ransford, Sophomore from Pensacola, Fla #15 Jasmine Richardson, Sophomore from Dale City, Va #22 Kyana Jacobs, and Freshman from East St. Louis, Ill #25 TeAndrea Smith.
Starting for Palm Beach Panthers were Sophomore from Marlboro, Md #1 Janay Borum, Freshman from Boynton, Fla #3 LaQuandra Brazil, Sophomore from Monroe, NC #10 Kayla Dayton, Sophomore from Winter Haven, Fla #22 Mechel-La Ward, and Freshman from Winter Haven, Fla #23 Erica Cooper.
In the first half, it was a rough and tough game between the Lady Pirates and the Panthers. The Lady Pirates pulled the lead (11-9) with 14:32 on the clock and took over from there leaving the score at half-time 35-19.
Just in the first half alone there were 28 fouls made between the Lady Pirates and the Panthers (14 per team). Lady Pirate Ronika Ransford was in jeopardy with 3 fouls already on her and Keonia Parrish with 4 fouls and Kayla Dayton with 3 fouls for the Panthers.
Lady Pirate TeAndrea Smith scored 13 points in the first half followed by Ronika Ransford with 7, Jasmine Richardson with 6, Kyana Jacobs with 4, Darnisha Hamilton with 3, and Brandy Broome with 2.
In the first half for the Panthers, Mechel-La Ward had 6 points , Janay Borum had 5 , LaQuandra Brazil had 4, Kayla Dayton had 3, and Sharneka McCatty had 1.
Going into the second half, the Lady Pirates were on fire and hungry for the win. At 18:37 they were up by 16 (37-21) and up by 22 (45-23) at 15:59.
Within the first five minutes of the game and only 2 seconds apart, Ronika Ransford got two fouls back to back (15:41, 15:39) for her fourth and fifth foul of the game causing her to foul out.
Before the middle of the second half, Brandy Broome came in hard scoring a 2, 2, 3, 2, 3 giving her 12 points within five minutes.
With 8:47 on the clock Panther Keonia Parrish picked up her fifth foul causing her to foul out of the game. By that time the Lady Pirates are ahead by 33 points (64-31).
With 6:54 on the clock, Darnisha Hamilton picked up her fourth foul and picked up her fifth at 4:33 taking her out of the game. The Lady Pirates were still ahead by 30 (71-41).
The clock was at 3:02 and Lady Pirate Brittany Watkins stepped up to score 6 points back to back in a little over a minute.
Down to 11.4 on the clock the score is at 78-52 with Khadijah Ellison at the line to make a free throw to leave the score 79-52 at the buzzer.
The top scorer’s for the Lady Pirates was Brandy Broome with 15, TeAndrea Smith with 13, Ronika
Ransford and Khadijah Ellison both with 9, Jasmine Richardson, Darnisha Hamilton and Brittany Watkins all with 8.
The top scorer’s for the Panthers were Kayla Dayton with 14, Janay Borum with 11, and both LaQuandra Brazil and Mechel-La Ward with 8.