By ANDREW FAISON/CORRESPONDENT
andrew.faison@yahoo.com

COURTLAND—The Southampton High School girls defeated Prince Edward 36-29 Wednesday night in the semifinal round of the Southside District tournament.

“My girls played really good defense tonight,” said Lady Indians Coach Aronda Bell. “And because of it, it was a low scoring game.”

Southampton will travel to Greensville High School to take on Brunswick at 6 p.m. today, Feb. 18, for the tournament championship.

The Lady Indians came into the tournament as the No. 1 seed and co-champions of the Southside District with a 14-4 overall record and a 13-5 record for district play. The Eagles came in as the No. 4 seed.

Leading the way for Southampton was Ronnie Powell with 11 points. Also assisting the Lady Indians were Regina Artis with 8 points and Tenicia Joyner with 12.

“It’s fine if we don’t score a lot of points as long as we keep the other team from scoring a whole lot of points,” Bell said.

With 3:43 left in the first quarter, Powell took an offensive rebound and put it back up for 2 points giving the Lady Indians a 5-2 lead.

Prince Edward was forced to call a timeout when Southampton went up 11-2 with 2:35 remaining in the quarter; the previous 4 points came from Artis.

Prince Edward immediately closed the gap when Samantha Applegate and Regisha Elliott both hit 3-pointers, making the score 11-8. The quarter ended with Southampton leading 13-8.

Artis was the first to score for the Lady Indians in the second quarter, extending the lead to 15-8. With 6:49 remaining in the half, Applegate hit another 3-pointer to close the gap to 15-11 for the Eagles. The half ended with Southampton leading 21-15.

“Going into Friday night’s game, we just need to make sure we play good defense like we did here tonight, and be able to get good looks at the basket each time we have a possession,” Bell said. “We have to have quality possessions on offense.”