There wasn’t much room for error for the Mexico girls on Saturday.
In the third-place game of the Montgomery County tournament, the Lady Bulldogs lost 75-57 to Hermann (3-2) after five of …
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There wasn’t much room for error for the Mexico girls on Saturday.
In the third-place game of the Montgomery County tournament, the Lady Bulldogs lost 75-57 to Hermann (3-2) after five of them fouled out. Mexico (1-3) trailed 25-6 after one quarter and couldn’t shrink its deficit to single digits the rest of the game.
Head coach Makenzie Mudd said Mexico wanted to be aggressive when playing Hermann, but the fouls started piling up. Multiple girls picked up their third foul in the first quarter so minutes had to be reduced.
“A lot of it was they called a lot of quick fouls on us, and it get into our heads,” Mudd said. “We felt like anytime we tried to play aggressively, they were going to call a foul. We started to question ourselves, and that really hurt us in the long run.”
Mudd said she had never had that many players foul out of a game before. She said Mexico usually likes to go after the ball on defense and attack the rim on offense.
“We gave up way too many drives and too many wide open shots because we were unsure if we should go or if we should wait because we didn’t know if we were going to get that foul call,” Mudd said.
Kealie Lane led Hermann with 29 points and 11 rebounds, and Andrea VanBooven had 10 points, eight rebounds and three blocks.
Alyssa Miller led Mexico with 27 points and 13 rebounds, Payton Shaw finished with 12 points and seven rebounds, and Grace Hudson had 11 points and five steals and made the all-tournament team. Mudd said the girls gave good effort because Mexico did come as close as 10 points before Hermann grew its lead again.
“We worked hard, but it didn’t fall our way,” Mudd said.
In Mexico’s other action during the week, it defeated North Central Missouri Conference and district rival Fulton 61-25 before losing 83-45 to No. 1 seed Clopton. Hudson led Mexico with 26 points against Fulton, Scottie Smith had 11 points, five rebounds and five assists, and Miller had 10 points and nine rebounds. Against Clopton, Hudson led with 16 points and Shaw had eight points.
The Lady Bulldogs played for third place for the second straight year. Mudd said she saw some positives in their other games this week, but she said the team has to find ways to score and limit the fouls.
“There were a lot of good team moments against Fulton,” Mudd said. “(On Friday), Clopton is a very strong team. We put up 45 points on them, and that’s something that nobody else had done this season. After playing a team that tough, it taught us a lot about how to stay aggressive and stay tough.”
Mexico plays at conference and district foe Kirksville (1-1) at 6:15 p.m. Tuesday.
