YOUNG HARRIS, Ga. – Virginia Scott scored a career-high 15 points as the Young Harris College women's basketball team recorded a 60-49 Peach Belt Conference victory over the University of Montevallo Wednesday (Jan. 14) evening at the YHC Basketball Arena.
The Mountain Lions won back-to-back games for the first time this season as they improved to 6-8 overall and to 3-4 in the Peach Belt while the Falcons fell to 1-13 and 0-7. Young Harris returns to action Saturday (Jan. 17) when they travel to Florence, South Carolina, for a 1:30 p.m. PBC contest against Francis Marion University.
Young Harris opened up a 29-22 lead at the half as Scott scored 11 points in the opening 20 minutes. After Montevallo tied the game at 16 on a Jacquelyn Thompson jumper in the paint, the Mountain Lions regained the lead on a Peyton Robertson jumper with 7:29 remaining. Young Harris expanded its lead to eight points (26-18) on a Scott jumper in the paint with 76 seconds left in the first half.
The Falcons battled back to tie the game at 32 on a three-pointer by Thompson with 15:24 left, but Young Harris reeled off six points – three layups by Chan Fann – to open a 38-32 lead with 12:18 remaining. Montevallo closed to as many as four points (44-40) on a Carrington Caise layup, but YHC took control of the game as they put together a 9-0 run over the next three minutes to open up a 53-40 lead on a Jasmine Knight jumper with 4:08 to play.
"It wasn't pretty, but there were some bright spots," said YHC interim head coach Matt Stearsman. "We were good enough to get a win tonight, which puts us right in the thick of the conference tournament hunt. Anytime you can hold a team under 50 points it's a good effort, but I think we could have played better. I am proud of this team's resiliency and their heart. I'm hoping we are turning the corner."
Robertson added 11 points and eight rebounds for Young Harris, which scored 24 points off 19 Montevallo turnovers. Briana Bell tallied eight points while Knight and Fann finished with seven.
Thompson paced the Falcons with 16 points and Katherine Goldsby added 10 more. Katija Tarailo grabbed nine rebounds while Katie Colson had eight rebounds.
