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ALBANY – The Southland Academy Varsity Girls Basketball Team (SAR) made the trip down U.S. Highway 19 to Albany on Tuesday with hopes of taking down a strong Deerfield-Windsor team (DWS). However, those hopes were dashed quickly, as the Lady Raiders fell behind early by a huge margin and would go on to lose to DWS by the score of 55-27 at the Deerfield-Windsor School.

This was a game in which the Lady Raiders were overmatched on both ends of the court. They struggled to score against the stingy defense of DWS and they could not stop the onslaught of the Lady Knights.

“They’re a very good team. This is definitely a Final Four team,” SAR Head Coach Chip Champion said regarding the Lady Knights. “We didn’t play our best early. I think we were intimidated by them a little bit. When we finally got fired there up in the second half, we actually played a lot better. We just have to keep grinding. Our goal is the end of the season. Basketball is such a long journey. We just have to keep getting better day by day.”

Mary Beth Easterlin led the Lady Raiders in scoring with 15 points and Adler Rae Owens chipped in six points in the losing cause.

The Lady Knights jumped out to a 7-0 lead to start the game before Champion called a timeout with 5:27 to go in the first quarter. Out of the timeout, DWS continued to widen its lead before Easterlin scored SAR’s first basket, making the score 11-2 in favor of the Lady Knights.

For the remainder of the quarter, SAR continued to struggle offensively, while the Lady Knights expanded their lead to 18-2 by the quarter’s end. During this period of the game, the Lady Raiders were struggling to score against the strong half court defense of the Lady Knights and they were committing turnovers.

DWS continued its onslaught in the second quarter by going on a 12-1 run to take a 26-3 lead before Champion called another timeout. Unfortunately for the Lady Raiders, they still continued to struggle offensively and by halftime, they trailed DWS 37-7.

It was much of the same early in the third quarter, as the Lady Knights went on an 8-0 run to take a 45-7 lead. However, the Lady Raiders were able to go on a 15-4 run in the second half and made it more competitive. Throughout the game, the Lady Raiders gave maximum effort on both ends of the court, but would end up falling to the Lady Knights by the score of 55-27.

Three Lady Knights scored in double figures. Joi Hubbard led DWS in scoring with 16 points, Hampton Rushton scored 13 and Gabby Harris chipped in 11 in the winning cause.

The Raiders are currently 6-10 overall and they are 2-2 in the GIAA Region 3-AAA standings. They will try to get back in the win column when they host Tiftarea Academy on Friday at 6:15 p.m.