Alba-Golden’s inability to hit three-point shots and Winnsboro’s ability to succeed at the same skill proved to be the difference when the two squads clashed in the Class 3A Region II semifinals Friday night at the Rockwall Howell High School Gym.

Alba-Golden’s Lady Panthers out-tallied the Lady Raiders 30-22 in the two-point portion of the court, but while the Lady Panthers only bucketed one three-pointer, the Lady Raiders were tossing in six, a scoring advantage of 15 points, too much to be overcome. As a result, the Lady Panthers dropped a 56-50 decision to the Lady Raiders.

Winnsboro was matched against Mt. Vernon, who defeated Pottsboro 57-50 in the semifinals, in the Regional Championship Game. In that contest, Mt. Vernon cruised to a 50-35 victory to win a ticket to the UIL Girls State Basketball Tournament Thursday through Saturday in San Antonio’s Alamodome.

Mt. Vernon (32-5) will be matched against Buffalo (27-4) in a 1:30 p.m. semifinal game Thursday. The winner of that game will play the winner of the 3 p.m. contest Thursday between Canadian (20-2) vs Goliad (29-7) with the semifinal game at 10 a.m. Saturday for the Class 3A State Championship.

Friday night the Lady Panthers had a little trouble getting started and found themselves down by 11 points, 21-10 at the end of the first quarter. They battled back to cut that margin to just four points, 30-26, at the half, outscoring the Lady Raiders 16-9 in that stanza.

After tying the score at 30-30 early in the third quarter, Alba-Golden pulled ahead 32-30 on a field goal by Jenny Carson and made it 34-30 on a field goal by Gracie Pendergrass.

A three-pointer by Winnsboro’s Sage Brown moved the Lady Raiders to within one point at 34-33 before Shelby Wright put in a two-point shot to give the Lady Panthers a three-point edge, 36-33 as time started to wear down in the third period. Darcy Mabry was having none of that for the Lady Raiders and she dropped in a nothing-but-net three-pointer to the score at 36. Teammate Navy Briggs pitched in a field goal to put the Lady Raiders ahead 38-36 with 44 seconds left in the period and Taryn Davis made the second of two foul shots with 7 seconds left on the clock to give Winnsboro a 39-36 advantage.

In the fourth quarter the Lady Raiders worked their lead all the way up to 11 points 52-41 but the Lady Panthers were not ready to throw in the towel yet. Two foul shots by Gracie Pendergrass, a field goal by Grace Bizzell, two foul shots by Pendergrass, and Alba-Golden’s only three-pointer of the night, a nothing-but-net bomb from Wright, saw the Winnsboro margin cut to three, 50-53, with 37 seconds left to play.

But that was it for the Lady Panthers while Winnsboro was able to sink three foul shots in the next 27 seconds to preserve the win by the final count of 56-50.

For the game, the Lady Panthers had to wrestle with foul problems, committing 26 during the 48 minutes of playing time. However, when it came to making free shots the Lady Panthers held their own, making 17 of 25 while the Lady Raiders, who committed just 20 personal fouls, were hitting 16 of 25 at the charity stripe.