By BOB REDD
Bluefield Daily Telegraph
PRINCETON — It was a tale of two halves Friday night at Princeton High School where the visiting Cabell Midland Knights defeated the Princeton Tigerettes, 56-54 in overtime.
It was all Princeton as the Tigerettes came out pressing and scoring points in transition. Threes by Danielle Hall and Taylor Hamm staked the home team to an early 6-2 lead which grew to 11-2 on a steal and lay up by Jaime Vest. Hamm’s three just before the buzzer gave Princeton a 17-7 lead at the end of one.
Princeton continued its pressure play and extended its lead in the second stanza and led by 20 points, 31-11 midway through the period. The Tigerettes took a 35-18 advantage into the break.
Midland came back in the third. The Knights went down low to post player McKenna Adkins and got outside baskets from Morgan Bennett, Taylor Adkins and Haley Haggerty to pull back into the game. Midland cut the lead to eight, but two Vest free throws put Princeton back up by 10. Vest then stole the inbound pass and scored to give her team a 12-point lead, 44-32. Midland scored the final six points of the quarter and the score stood at 44-38 with eight minutes left in regulation.
Cabell Midland continued to cut into the Princeton lead. Put-backs by Bennett and Summer Stephenson made it a two point game with just over five minutes to play. Midland took its first lead with 3:30 to go when Haggerty drilled a three and the Knights led 51-50.
Barker drew Princeton even at 52 with a basket with 2:17 to go and after a Midland turnover the Tigerettes got the ball back at the 2:00 mark and spread the floor. Adrianna Mitchem gave Princeton a 54-52 lead with a basket from the wing with 1:04 to play and she later stole the ball with 40 ticks on the clock.
The Tigerettes had opportunities to score from the free throw line on two separate occasions, but missed the front end of one-and-one situations, the last coming with 24.6 to go. Cabell Midland moved the ball down court and called time with six seconds showing on the scoreboard. A shot missed, but a rebound and stickback by Stephenson at the buzzer tied the score and sent the game to overtime.
In the overtime period the only points were a basket by Haggerty. Princeton went 0-for-6 from the charity stripe in the extra period and a Tigerette shot at the buzzer did not fall.
“The first half we played like we wanted to win. The second half we were just trying not to loose,” said Princeton head coach Charlie Angell. “We quit doing what we were doing, we quit attacking the basket, we just got passive and just threw it around at half court and let them steal the ball.
“We didn’t concentrate and switch off on defense like we are supposed to. Give it to Cabell Midland, their girls got a little taste of it and they refused to lose and that was the difference in the game.”
Vest led Princeton and all scorers with 20 points and Hamm added 11.
Haggerty paced Cabell Midland with 19 and McKenna Adkins tallied 12.
Cabell Midland head coach Matt Adkins talked about the conversations he had with his team during halftime.
“I told them they were going to walk home,” Adkins joked. “We actually told them we knew they were worried abut missing their shots. I told them it’s made up one possession at a time, it’s not made up all at once and they really bought into that.
“We told them to win the third quarter by eight and we won it by nine I think, and we were back in the game. Then we went into overtime and I told them, ‘girls, we had a bad first half, so this is our first half’ and they played pretty well in overtime. I take my hat off. We’re young. I think we finished the game with three freshmen on the floor.”
On Princeton’s free throw efforts Angell said, “We’ve been shooting as a team probably 60 percent, which is not bad for high school girls basketball. Tonight we were 12-of-31. We left 20 points right there. This is the second overtime game we’ve lost that we should have never let get into overtime. We did the same thing at Nitro.”
Cabell Midland moved to 3-2 on the season. Princeton dropped to 2-7 and will play next on Tuesday at Summers County.

At Ralph Ball Court
CABELL MIDLAND (3-2)
Maddie Bess 0 0-0 0, Taylor Adkins 3 0-1 7, Haley Haggerty 6 5-5 19, Morgan Bennett 3 1-5 7, Summer Stephenson 3 0-0 6, Rachel Morgan 0 0-0 0, Allie Bennett 1 1-1 3, McKenna Adkins 5 2-4 12, Faith Craddock 0 0-0 0, Mackenzie Dillon 1 0-0 2, Totals 22 9-16 56
PRINCETON (2-7)
Danielle Hall 2 2-2 7, Taylor Hamm 4 1-7 11, Adrianna Mitchem 3 1-2 7, Jaime Vest 8 3-5 20, Kaleigh Barker 2 3-9 7, Day Day Eaves 0 2-6 2, Totals 19 12-31 54
Cabell Midland.........7 10 21 16 2 — 56
Princeton..................17 18 9 10 0 — 54
Three-point baskets: CM 3(T. Adkins, Haggerty 2); P 4 (Hall, Hamm 2, Vest)