FAYETTEVILLE — A hometown crowd and the excitement surrounding the first Class 7A State Tournament game of the day were not nearly enough to lift the Fayetteville girls basketball team past a young and talented bunch from North Little Rock on Wednesday.
The Charging Wildcats faced some concerns of their own on how several young players in the lineup would handle the state tournament atmosphere. But those questions were quickly answered as North Little Rock turned up the pressure defense and turned to freshman Kyra Collier and sophomore Malika Monk for a combined 35 points in a 58-35 win against Fayetteville at Bulldog Arena.
North Little Rock forced 16 first-half turnovers and built a 27-15 lead by the half. Collier nailed three 3-pointers before intermission and had 13 points at the break as the Charging Wildcats ended the second quarter on a 12-3 run to take control.
NORTH LITTLE ROCK 58, FAYETTEVILLE 35
North Little Rock 11 16 15 16 — 58
Fayetteville 5 10 11 9 — 35
North Little Rock (18-7): Collier 23, Monk 12, Hardamon 11, Hill 5, Giles 4, Harris 2, Mays 1.
Fayetteville (11-17): Edie 10, Crockett 7, Schuldt 6, Breden 3, Brewer 3, Allen 2, Robinson 2, Denek. White 2.
“We knew that would be a huge advantage, getting after their guards a little bit,” North Little Rock coach Daryl Fimple said. “We’re so young that I think we were a little bit nervous and we wouldn’t even shoot it there at first. But as the game went on a little bit we got after them more and more, and that’s something that’s going to keep us in a lot of games is our pressure.”
Fayetteville (11-17) never seriously threatened in the second half. With North Little Rock harassing the Lady Bulldogs with full-court pressure defense, things only got more difficult as the Charging Wildcats began to knock down more shots after intermission, shooting 48 percent from the floor after the break.
“We knew the pressure was coming. We kind of had a plan for that and we knew how to kind of slow them down offensively just playing soft man-to-man,” Fayetteville coach Vic Rimmer said. “But we had no idea they could shoot the ball like that. And that’s what I told Daryl after the game. If they shoot the ball like that, they’re as good as anybody in the whole tournament.”
Aubrey Edie, playing in her final game with the Lady Bulldogs, finished with a team-high 10 points. Sophomores Sydney Crockett added seven and six points, respectively.
North Little Rock (18-7), the No. 4 seed from the 7A/6A-Central, will face Bentonville — the top seed from the 7A/6A-West — at 4 p.m. today.