WOODVILLE &8212; While others were taking tests, spending time with families and away from the basketball court, so were the Trinity Episcopal Lady Saints.

Just not near as long.

For them, the Christmas season seemed like a blip on a radar screen compared to others. There was the game against Class AAA power Central Private Dec. 22 before breaking for the holidays, and they came back Tuesday to get back to work &8212; a four-day holiday break.

So when everyone tried to shake off the holiday break at the WCCA Shootout Friday and Thursday, there was nothing for Trinity to shake off. The Lady Saints handed Claiborne Academy a 50-28 defeat Friday to finish the tournament 3-0.

The three wins were by a combined score of 186-58.

&8220;I&8217;m thankful because in all honesty, we haven&8217;t had a long time off,&8221; Trinity head coach Melanie Hall said. &8220;We had four days. They worked hard those days, and then we had this. These last four games gave us an opportunity to get back in our offense and defense and get ready to go.&8221;

The win over a tough Claiborne squad put the icing on a successful weekend with District 4-AA action resuming Tuesday when the Lady Saints travel to Centreville. Thursday&8217;s games were over quickly with an 80-11 win over WCCA and a 56-19 win over Ben&8217;s Ford.

To beat Claiborne &8212; who was 12-1 coming in with a win over Tensas Academy &8212; the Lady Saints had to switch to a zone defense and go without point guard Molly Butts (out of town) and forward Courtney Timm (sprained back).

&8220;We have a good little group, and we&8217;ve been gether forever,&8221; Trinity senior Jessica Marchbanks said. &8220;It&8217;s finally our turn. We didn&8217;t want to (come out flat). If you get too cocky, it&8217;s all gone. We treated them as regular district games. Once we got a lead, we worked on what we worked on in practice.&8221;

It was the zone defense that may have caused the most havoc for a Claiborne team that had good size and good ball handlers. Hall&8217;s club spent most of the game in a 1-3-1 and later opted for a 2-3 zone to keep the emphasis in the inside while denying the Lady Rebels&8217; primary shooters any good looks.

The Lady Saints led 34-20 after the third quarter before hitting six of eight three throws during a stretch to put the lead at 20.

&8220;When I had (Lauren) Tanner and them, that (zone) was actually what they did,&8221; Hall said. &8220;When (this team) was in junior high, that&8217;s what they did. They haven&8217;t played it varsity as much, but they know what we have to do and where we have to go. (Claiborne) is a good basketball team, and (three players) can shoot the lights out. Our kids knew that. We didn&8217;t give them any good looks, and they had to work for everything they got.&8221;

And it frustrated the Lady Rebels, who were dealing with post-holiday issues themselves having not played a game since Dec. 9. The Lady Rebels had just six field goals heading into the fourth quarter &8212; Trinity had seven in the third quarter alone &8212; and couldn&8217;t find any rhythm on the offensive end.

&8220;They out-hustled us and out-played us,&8221; Claiborne head coach Ronnie Powell said. &8220;They played better than we did. The reason we&8217;re here is we haven&8217;t played in three weeks, and we&8217;ve only practiced twice since then. Trinity is the kind of team we&8217;ve got to beat, and hopefully later in the year we can. But they played well today and out-played us on both ends of the floor.&8221;

The game was just as one-sided as the score indicates with the Lady Saints taking a four-point lead in the second quarter and pulling away from there with their zone defense. Haley Spear hit a 3-pointer for the Lady Rebels early in the fourth, but by then it made the deficit only 36-23.

Any euphora from it didn&8217;t last long. Eliza Jones answered it the next trip down to put the lead back at 16.

&8220;We knew we didn&8217;t have a lot of people,&8221; Marchbanks said. &8220;If we&8217;d foul, we wouldn&8217;t stay in the game. We tried the 1-3-1, and we tried the other zone. That&8217;s our strong point. We&8217;ve been working on our zone ever since the seventh grade. It&8217;s in our brains. We&8217;re normally very good in a man, but we bring out our zone as kind of our special weapon.&8221;