NATCHEZ &045; This race in Division 6-5A girls is just making no sense.

Natchez High has the unfortunate responsibility of going into the tournament as the No. 4 seed in the four-team region, but you might have a hard time finding someone wanting to play them.

After its convincing 48-30 win over Forest Hill that featured more turnovers and missed free throws to the Lady Bulldogs’ liking, saying there are mixed feelings among division coaches is kind of like saying this reality TV thing is a fad that will never catch on.

And the reality of it is the Lady Bulldogs (7-10, 2-4) may just do something interesting at the tournament in two weeks.

&uot;We’ve lost a lot, but we’ve been trying to come back and work hard in practice,&uot; said NHS head coach Steve McClatchy, whose team has beaten the top two teams in the division. &uot;We keep trying to tell them they’re a good ball team. Tonight we really needed a win. We’ve got a couple of weeks before the district tournament, and that’s what we’re shooting for. Hopefully we can upset somebody.&uot;

The Lady Rebels (11-10, 3-2) weren’t too happy after Friday’s game after having troubles throughout the game against the Lady Bulldogs’ defense. Natchez got a number of steals in its full-court man from the second quarter on, and it gave Forest Hill struggles from the start.

Natchez led by 11 at halftime, never strayed from its defense and never lost a double-digit cushion.

&uot;Man to man, just playing aggressive defense and staying focused,&uot; point guard Mable Green said. &uot;Playing hard and coming out real focused and ready to play. Competing hard all the time and coming out on the floor ready to go. It (four division losses) got us real fired up and ready to go.&uot;

The Lady Bulldogs held Forest Hill to just 18 points heading into the fourth quarter thanks to that full-court man.

The Lady Rebels got two free throws from Taneika Martin with 4:57 left to put Natchez High’s lead at 38-24 before the Lady Bulldogs scored six straight points to put the game away.

Wennifer Noble, who led the Lady Bulldogs with 13 points, nailed two free throws and followed with a bucket nine seconds later. Noble then missed a jumper with 3:29 left, but Delequa Drake’s putback put the lead at 44-24.

&uot;The coaches told us the last time we played them they didn’t have good ball handlers,&uot; Drake said. &uot;If we applied pressure, we could score off the defense. Our guards did a good job of pressing the ball and making them turn the ball over. We came into this game knowing it was our last district game. We got focused and ready.&uot;

The six-point run late in the game was just bad things that went worse for the Lady Rebels, who didn’t score until Tameka Scott’s basket with 1:07 left in the first quarter. They had just three field goals the entire first half and trailed 21-10 at the break.

&uot;We really never got into any kind of rhythm in anything,&uot; Forest Hill head coach Tommy Groves said. &uot;But we did play solid defense in the first half. We didn’t handle the ball well almost the whole game. We’ve been playing some of our better basketball, but tonight we couldn’t make close-up shots and couldn’t handle their pressure very well.&uot;

The full-court man with the occasional trap was the biggest culprit, and the Lady Bulldogs got a layup from Brittany West with 1:34 left in the first half for that 11-point lead at the break.

Then as things slowed down the Lady Bulldogs went inside to Drake and big Shariker Hargrave, who combined for 10 points in the second half. Drake tossed in a bucket at the start of the second half, and Hargrave finished it off with a basket underneath with 23 seconds left for a 33-18 lead

heading into the fourth quarter.

&uot;It was our full-court man,&uot; McClatchy said. &uot;We started out with a zone press, and three or four minutes prior to halftime we went to a full-court man. We saw that was going to be effective, so we stayed with it the whole half.&uot;