Plano East junior Sicily Jackson deflects the ball out of the hands of a McKinney player during a Dec. 31 home game. The Lady Panthers defeated the Lionettes 55-36. Photo by Maddie Smith / C&S Media
By David Wolman
When the Plano East girls basketball team fell behind 11-6 following a barrage of 3-pointers by McKinney, head coach Derrick Richardson told his Lady Panthers to continue to focus on their defensive assignments.
The Lady Panthers heeded the words of their head coach, and with it came a dominating stretch of basketball.
Plano East held McKinney scoreless in the second quarter after they gave up 15 points in the first quarter, and the Lady Panthers got 25 points from freshman Arianna Robinson in a dominant 55-36 win.
“We’ve just been working on some new defensive sets that we recently put in,” Richardson said. “It gave us a chance to work up on some kinks. Some of that was a result of it, just bad rotations sometimes. But we got better as the game went along.”
McKinney came into the Dec. 31 game having struggled to a 2-16 overall record, but Richardson told his Lady Panthers not to overlook the Lionettes. He praised the young talent that McKinney has on its roster, including sophomore twin sisters Abbi and Addison Tillson.
Plano East struggled to defend the 3-point shooting of the Tillson sisters, who made three 3-pointers in the game’s first two and a half minutes.
McKinney also did damage inside the paint with a layup giving the Lionettes an 11-6 advantage.
Plano East rallied with a 6-0 run to take their first lead of the contest at 12-11 following a steal by Sicily Jackson and subsequent layup by Arianna Robinson, but McKinney retook the lead at 14-12 after the Lionettes made their fourth 3-pointer of the opening frame.
“The start to the game, in all honesty, wasn’t that great,” Richardson said. “We just didn’t come out with the right mindset, but I felt like that we did a good job of picking it up. They hit some shots early. We knew that they could do that, particularly those (Tillson) twins. They’re good players for being just sophomores, and their sister was a good player.”
For as much as Plano East struggled to defend the three-point line in the first quarter, the Lady Panthers remained focused on the game plan.
After allowing 14 points over the game’s first six-and-a-half minutes, Plano East proceeded to put the clamps on McKinney’s offense.
Plano East (15-6, 5-1) held McKinney to just one point over the final 9:32 of the first half, and to zero in the second quarter.
“Once we decided to play hard and with the right mindset, we did a great job,” Richardson said. “We did a great job at the end of the first quarter and then in the second to shut them out.”
A big reason for that success came as the result of the Lady Panthers’ ability to force 29 Lionette turnovers, 11 of which came in the second quarter.
One of those steals led to a layup by Robinson for a 29-15 Lady Panthers lead with 2:52 remaining in the first half.
Sophomore Kennedy Borders scored 10 of her 14 points during the first half.
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