Thompson earns first win as Lady Blues beat Haskell

New Graham girls basketball head coach Baylee Thompson is undefeated in her new position.

Though there’s still plenty of basketball left to play this year and for Thompson as a coach, her Lady Blues team kicked off its season and her head coaching career with a 44-37 win on the road Tuesday, Nov. 5 at Haskell.

This year’s roster has seen a bit of turnover with three seniors from last year’s class moving on due to graduation and a couple players not returning. But in this season opener, the Lady Blues were led by their strong group of returning athletes.

It may not have always looked pretty — first games of the season rarely ever are — but Graham made the shots and got the stops necessary to earn a solid opening night victory. 

And for a new head coach, it was exciting to see the product out on the floor.

“It feels great; I'm excited. The girls are starting to buy into what I've been trying to teach them, because they're starting to see it work,” Thompson said. “... If we can just fine tune all the things we've been working on, I really think we're just going to keep getting better and better.”

Graham’s roster may not be large as the team only has nine varsity players, but each active participant made contributions in the game. Six different Lady Blues scored points and four of them hauled in rebounds.

The Lady Blues were led by Briley Randall, who scored a team-high 21 points in the game. During difficult moments in stretches of the second and third quarters, Randall became a go-to player who knocked down some important shots to propel the team forward.

From the start of the game and most of the evening the Lady Blues led the way. Graham jumped out to an 11-5 lead after the first quarter of play, as the visitors kept Haskell in check.

But in the second quarter, the home team Maidens began to show some fight. Haskell resorted to a full-court press defense to force Graham into difficult passing situations.

After Haskell opened the period with a basket to make it 11-7, the Lady Blues committed back-to-back turnovers. However, the home team struggled to make shots while Graham continued to rebound the ball well.

Ava Street scored her only two points of the night on a mid-range jump shot in the quarter, while Randall and Fayth Bryer pitched in buckets as well. But at halftime, Graham held a slim 17-13 lead.

“We talked about being patient. … I knew the press was coming the whole game,” the head coach said. “Since last week, we've been working press break, being calm, looking for our middle girl, not rushing it, which a few times we did. Whenever we did we'd start panicking, and that's when (Haskell was) able to climb back in. So it's just finding that reset to slow down and do what we know to do.”

While Haskell’s defense continued to present problems for Graham, both teams found their shooting strokes a bit more in the second half. 

The Maidens eventually tied the game at 24-24, but a fastbreak layup from Bryer pushed the Lady Blues ahead 26-24 heading into the fourth quarter.

The Lady Blues kept their foot on the gas in the fourth, and despite Haskell’s best efforts, Graham’s offense was simply better. Savannah Fricks, Randall and Addyson Weaver all had big 3-pointers in the quarter, and by the time the buzzer sounded, Thompson and her Lady Blues were 1-0 to start the season.

Randall finished with 21 points and five rebounds, Rebecca McGregor ended with 2 points, seven assists and six rebounds and Weaver had 9 points and six rebounds.

Above all, Thompson was pleased with the effort from each individual player, and she believes that will carry them to more wins this season.

“We're hustling on defense. We're hustling on offense. We're sprinting down the floor trying to beat the other team down (the court),” Thompson said. “We talk about being the first team down the court both ways, and I saw them trying to do that, and that's the buy-in part that I'm talking about.”