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Lady Wildcats Survive to Win 12th in a Row

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COCHRAN, Ga. — The No. 8 Bethel Lady Wildcats continued their winning ways with a 65-60 win at Middle Georgia State Saturday. It was Bethel’s 12th consecutive victory pushing their record to 20-4 overall and 9-1 in the SSAC. The Lady Cats won for the sixth straight time in Cochran and have beaten MGS in all ten meetings between the programs. Middle Georgia dropped to 10-7 and 5-5.
A cold shooting first quarter found the Lady Wildcats down 17-11 after one. Ty Willis (6) and Ge’ Naisha Robinson (5) were the only players to score for Bethel in the first 10 minutes.
Trailing by eight (15-23) midway of the second quarter, Bethel’s defense kept them in the game holding the Knights to just one made free throw in the last five minutes of the quarter. Meanwhile the Lady Wildcats finally found some offense, outscoring MGS 10-1 to close out the first half to lead 25-24. Robinson, on an assist from Ryann Roberts hit a shot with two seconds left to give Bethel the one-point margin. Bethel was 0-12 from behind the three-point stripe but had a 20-4 advantage in points in the paint.
The third stanza saw both squads battle back and forth until Ashton Hulme nailed a basket followed by a Morgan Martin three pointer which gave Bethel a 45-40 margin with a minute left in the quarter. Robinson finished the quarter with a game high 19 points. Bethel led 48-42 after three.
MGS fought back to take a 58-57 lead in the fourth but Bethel’s Millie Bryant knocked down a huge trifecta to give the Cats a 60-58 margin. After the Knights tied the game, it was a Bryant three again on an assist from Tasia Jones and the Cats led 63-60 lead. MGS had several opportunities to tie the game only to see Bethel survive and win by five.

Robinson finished with a career high 21 points. She also collected eight rebounds. Martin followed with 13 points. Her three three-pointers gives her 238 career three’s. She is just three away from tying former Bethel great Katie Van Dyke, the program all-time leader who had 241. Martin has 1, 285 career points which is 9th all-time in program history. Jones had eight points and eight assists. Willis finished with eight points after leaving the game in the second quarter with an ankle injury. Joy Sadler led MGS with 18 points.
Key factors in the game included Bethel productivity in the paint and in bench scoring. The Lady Cats had a 42-20 advantage in points in the paint and a 24-4 margin in bench points.
Coach Chris Nelson thought his team was able to prevail because they maintained their composure on the road. “We found a way on the road today. It was good for us to face adversity and see how we would handle it. Ty went down in the start of the 2nd quarter and we had to adjust our rotations and then we faced foul trouble in the 3rd quarter and had to change our rotations again. Joy Sadler is one of the top post players in our league and we had to guard her by committee. With that said, I thought our girls did a great job keeping their composure and really feeding off of each other. Ge played a huge game and really stepped up for her team. Tasia continued to be aggressive and helped create great looks for our post and guards. Morgan and Millie hit some timely shots and we were able to get out with a tough road win.”
Bethel resumes action Thursday at home playing host to rival Martin Methodist. The Lady Cats beat the Hawks 73-61 earlier this season in Pulaski.
Tip-off from Crisp Arena will be at 5:30 p.m. The Countdown to Tip-off Show begins at 5 p.m. on WEIO, 100.9 and at: https://www.thefarmradio.com/

Bethel University, Basketball