Improving to 4-0 after defeating Coffee County 54-41 on Tuesday night in Douglas, the Bradwell Lady Tigers will hit the court tonight against Groves for their first region game of the season.
Lady Tiger coach Faye Baker said despite winning by a large margin, there is still much work to be done to prepare for the peak of the season.
"We don’t want to be playing our best ball right now anyway," she said. "We want to peak at the right time, which is about mid-season to the end of the season. We are still trying to find our way, the right chemistry and our rotation off the bench. This is all still a work in progress. Right now, it’s a blessing we are able to win but we are not at that peaking point yet."
However, there are things the coach said her team is doing better this season compared with last year, especially when it comes to their turnover ratio per game.
"Before the Coffee County game we were only averaging 12 turnovers a game, which is considerably better than we were last year when we averaged 25," Baker said. "Our goal is to average 15 or less, so we are under what we expected and I think it has a lot to do with the maturity level of this team."She said the girls didn’t commit as many fouls against Coffee as they did in their past few games.
"But we played a little sluggish last night," the coach said. "Even though we won, it was not one of our best performances. It was a two-hour drive to Coffee County and I think the ride might have taken its toll on some of our kids. We came out a little flat and we missed a lot of lay ups early. I can recall seven missed layups in the first half, which kept the game pretty close."
But she said it was the defense that helped them pull away for the win.
The girls host Groves tonight at 7 p.m. The teams played each other during the Joe Greene Tournament and Baker’s squad won 76-34.
But, Baker said the previous score means nothing.
"Everybody who plays us is going to play hard because I think most people see us as the team to beat this year," she said. "We are pretty much sitting at the top as the sitting target and everybody is going to play up and try to play us tough, and we are going to have to be ready regardless of what the score was the first time we played them. We want to go in not taking anything for granted."