For a majority of Tuesday’s game, Boyle County girls were in complete control at Danville.

The Admirals came back from a 20-point deficit to take a lead in the fourth quarter, but the Rebels’ experience proved vital down the stretch in a 76-70 victory.

Boyle led 39-23 at halftime and extended that lead early in the third quarter, but Danville’s run — led by junior Ivy Turner — started midway through the quarter and extended in to the fourth. Turner led all scorers with 34 points in her return to the lineup after missing five games.

Danville would take a 67-66 lead with under three minutes to play, but Boyle had a trio of seniors carry the team through the fourth quarter.

““The last thing I said going out there, I said, ‘girls, you’ve been in a lot of these games. A lot of big games. So just do what you do,’” Boyle County head coach Greg Edwards said. “I thought the seniors stepped up.”

Danielle Roney scored eight points, going 5-for-6 from the foul line, in the fourth quarter. Gracie Edmiston scored seven in the fourth and McKayla Baker led the Rebels with 16 points.

Edmiston was out of the game for a majority of the second and third quarters due to foul trouble — she finished the game with four.

“Gracie, she got handcuffed all night,” Edwards said. “She probably played nine minutes total. I thought she had three blocks that they called fouls. I told her, sometimes you’ve just got to overcome that. She came back in and she was focused, she didn’t get that fifth foul and did a good job staying out there for us.”

The Rebels’ first-half lead was in large part due to a 1-3-1 zone that caused Danville trouble, but a halftime reminder from Ads’ head coach Clifford Berry helped break that zone and come back into the game.

“We’ve been working on it the past couple of days, but when we came in at halftime about attacking it over the top,” Berry said. “Once we got a couple easy baskets, they had to back up some. But if you’re not attacking that 1-3-1 is going to keep you up and you won’t have a gap to attack. We were able to get some easy ones and we were able to attack the basket some.”

The Admirals trailed in the first quarter 9-0 — something that Berry said came down to youth.

“They’re learning, they’re learning the game. It’s going to take time,” Berry said. “What killed them was the crowd. They were nervous from the beginning. That’s why they got out to a 9-0 start. We finally got loosened up and got going, but we’ve just got youth all over the floor. They made middle school mistakes sometimes, it’s simple things. But that’s a good thing. The minute they stop fighting hard, we’ll never have a game like this. That’s the good thing.”

Turner took over in the fourth, scoring 13 points as the Ads came back.

“Give Danville credit, too, they could’ve folded there but they played tough,” Edwards said. “(Zone) has its advantages but it’s hard to stay in something like that for the whole game. We had a really good stretch there and then Ivy, being the good player that she is, exposed us a little bit and got to the rim. We put in a defense at the end and I think that caused them all sorts of problems, it kind of slowed her down.”

The comeback wasn’t just down to Turner, Berry said.

“Once Lara Akers got going, I really think that’s the missing piece for us,” the Admirals’ coach said. “When she gets going, that’s the other scorer we have beside Ivy. Same as Carolina Gonzalez, she started to attack the rim. A lot of times they just kind of leave it to Ivy to attack the basket and they want to stand and shoot threes. They can create easy offense for the rest of the team. But I really think once we extended our 2-3 a little bit, kept the ball in front of us, that helped slow us down and got the pace to where we wanted.”

Edwards was happy with his bench play — four different bench players scored and kept the Rebels ahead in the second quarter when Edmiston was out with foul trouble.

“I thought Emily Glasscock played big, she’s been out with a broken wrist,” Edwards said. “Really tonight was the first night that I got her in much. I thought I got good play from Kasey (McGirr), Lindsey (Wren), Keeley (Bowling), Brooke (Coffman). I had a bunch of people coming off of the bench who had to play minutes and they all did a good job. We keep getting good bench play.”

The Rebels improve to 2-0 in district play, and Edwards said he’d like to see his team clamp down when they have a big lead.

“At one point we were up 25, I think,” Edwards said. “It looked like things were going to play out and we could extend the lead, but I thought we got complacent and settled for jump shots when we could’ve attacked more. I told the girls that we’ve got to learn from that, we’ve got to keep attacking the rim … It’s a big district win, any time you can get a road win, that’s important too.”

Danville falls to 0-2 in district play, but Berry was excited that his team came back and showed what it’s capable of in future district games.

“I look at it like this: We played Lincoln, had a great first half and they had to play without Ivy,” he said. “For us to battle and show that we could play, that’s what I needed. I needed some film to show them. And now they’re giving it to me. I think we can come back in these games and we’ll be a different team. I really think the future is bright.”

 

Box score

 

Boyle County 15 24 15 22 — 76

Danville 14 9 25 22 — 70

 

Points

Boyle County: Danielle Roney 14, McKayla Baker 16, Rachael Leath 8, Gracie Edmiston 18, Lauren Steinhauer 4, Emily Glasscock 7, Lindsey Wren 2, Kasey McGirr 2, Keeley Bowling 5.

 

Danville: Ivy Turner 34, Lara Akers 11, Carolina Gonzalez 9, Kirby Harrison-Alcorn 8, Ahyana Burnett 4, Desiree Tandy 2, Madison Terrell 2.