Albany — Crisp County High’s girls basketball team made its first official start of a game this season without its former star player Tuesday night and even though it lost it still played reasonably well.

Going up against a now 10-5, 7-2 Dougherty girls team that entered the game with ambitions of avenging a previous 42-28 defeat to them, the Lady Cougars dropped a 50-38 re-match decision.

The visitors did manage to break even in the Region 1-AAAA doubleheader, however, as the Cougars followed up on their earlier 48-35 win over the now 5-9, 4-5 Trojans by prevailing 58-45.

Both the Lady Cougars (10-6, 7-3) and Cougars (7-11, 6-4) will return to action on Saturday at 6 when they visit Monroe High’s region-leading squads.

Dougherty 50, Crisp 38 (girls)

With 6-foot-3 post player Nasheema Oliver no longer on the squad as the result of an in-game incident that occurred last Friday, Crisp couldn’t mount the firepower or inside strength needed to defeat its host.

Dougherty took a low-scoring 7-2 first period lead that it upped to 22-12 at intermission and hiked to 37-21 in the third stanza before the Lady Cougars went on a 12-2 run that brought them to within six, 39-33, 6:15 from the finish.

They could get no closer, though, as Amber Ward, whose 18 points made her the game’s leading scorer, ran off five straight to again restore the Lady Trojans’ advantage to double digits at 44-33 and all but ice the outcome.

“We started off slowly, but then jumped back into the game when we went to our press in the third quarter,” coach Barrett Wilkes said afterwards.

 “When they continued to pack their defense inside, we had options that we didn’t execute. In the end, our comeback effort proved to be too little, too late.

“Had we hit a few more free throws (Crisp was only eight of 17 from the line) and some of the easy shots we missed, it could have wound up a different story.”

Dee Williams and Taylor Green took up some of the scoring slack created by Oliver’s departure. The former had 12 points and 10 rebounds while the latter sank 10 points and snared 11 caroms.

Score by Quarters

Crisp County 2-10-19-7 — 38

Dougherty 7-15-17-11 — 50

Scoring

Crisp County (38) — Nisha Waters, Dee Dee Williams 12, Deletria Colson 6, Kayla Green 6, Alexis Felton 7, Daja Chambliss, Niqueria Jones, Miah Burks 1, Jalexia Fenn.

Team totals: field goals 14; free throws 8 of 17 (47.1%); fouls 15; 3-pointers — Colson 2; fouled out — Green.

Dougherty (50) — Raketa Shelton 11, Takiya Davis 3, Quanneshia Gatling 17, Brittany Fowler 1, Amber Ward 18.

Team totals: field goals 19; free throws 8 of 17 (47.1%); fouls 15; 3-pointers — Davis 1, Ward 3; fouled out — Shelton.

Cougars 58, Trojans 45

It took them 18 games to do so, but the Cougars finally managed back-to-back wins for the first time this season when they decked Dougherty’s Trojans four nights after they had whipped Worth’s Rams.

And for a second straight time, coach Terry Smith attributed the favorable outcome to the overall defensive performance turned in by his team and the energy boost Landon Whitman provided off the bench.

“Defense was the story along with the fact that Landon came up big for us again with the energy and toughness he brings when he steps on the court,” Smith said.

“Our diamond press and 1-2-2 zone enabled us to hold down their scoring plus we also outrebounded them. (Taylor) Walls made a huge contribution, too, in helping us break Dougherty’s press with his quickness, ballhandling and decision making.

“It also helped that we shot well as we wound up having as balanced scoring as we’d had all year. Overall, it was just a solid team effort.”

That type performance paid off in Crisp’s success in winning the scoring battle for three of the four quarters. By periods, it owned advantages of 11-8, 32-24 and 45-38.

Javoris Cooks canned 13 points and Whitman flipped in 11 for the Cougars. Al Brown paced the Trojans with 10.

Score by Quarters

Crisp County 11-21-13-13 — 58

Dougherty 8-16-14-7 — 45

Scoring

Crisp County (58) — Javoris Cooks 13, Landon Whitman 11, Montre’ Hartage 8, Davion Harvey 6, Taylor Walls 5, Shaquille West 5, Rashad Buckholts 3, Primetime Hamilton 3, Montel Richard 2, Kerrion Harris 2, Eddie Morgan, C.J. McGriff, Clement Burnam.

Team totals: field goals 20; free throws 12 of 18 (66.7%); fouls 14; 3-pointers — Harvey 2, Hartage 2, Walls 1, Cooks 1; fouled out — West.

Dougherty (45) — Al Brown 10, Michael Miller 9, Montrell Sisroe 6, Shun Wheller 5, Shay Wheller 4, Tevin Smith 4, Montavis Jones 3, Mardarious McWhorter 2, Tavarious Nelson 2.

Team totals: field goals 17; free throws 8 of 16 (50%); fouls 14; 3-pointers — Brown 2, S. Wheller 1; fouled out — none.