Northeast Fl- One of the best games so far in this early season of girls’ basketball in Northeast Florida featured the Jackson Tigers against the Bolles Bulldogs Monday night. Both teams appear in the top 4 of our team rankings and they played like it Monay night.
Both teams are very well coached, Jackson by Monica Gibson and Bolles by Kelly Stevenson. This game also featured two players that made our All-Area Preseason Second Team in Xaniya Jackson for Jackson and Abby Knauff for Bolles. Another top player, Alexia Taliferro did not play dut to a concussion. Xaniya Jackson was in foul trouble for much of the game, but still ended up leading her team in scoring with 14 points. Abby also led her team in scoring with 16 points.
The game was closely contested throughout as neither team could pull away. The lead changed hands multiple times throughout the first half. Bolles took the lead into halftime 28-27. Defense was the name of the game, and it tightened up in the second half as both teams struggled to score.
The difference was that Jackson was able to convert that defense into offense at a higher clip. Though the lead never reached double digits, Jackson began to pull away from Bolles at beginning of the fourth quarter.
Bolles was able to stay in the game with two timely three-pointes from Abby Knauff out of timeouts. Jackson though, seemed to always have an answer on the other end. The play of the game was made by Kimora Hester, as she got a big block on Abby Knauff as she was driving in for a layup. Hester then got the rebound and went coast to coast for a lay-up that would ice the game. Jackson got the impressive win 51-44 over Bolles.
Bolles next plays at Raines on December 8th and at Providence on December 9th.
Jackson next plays at home against Tallahassee Leon on December 12th.
