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BRIDGE CITY – After making a huge comeback attempt the Bridge City Lady Cardinals could not quite overcome the tenacious pressure of East Chambers as the Lady Bucs notched a 60-43 nondistrict victory at Cardinal Gym Tuesday afternoon.

The Lady Cardinals (7-7) rallied back from a 20-7 first-quarter deficit and took a 36-30 lead with the 3:24 left in the third quarter after back-to-back three-point bombs by Chloe Huff.

The Lady Bucs kicked it into high gear after that, outscoring the Lady Cardinals 30-7 the rest of the way, sparked by a 12-point fourth quarter by Valencia Thomas.

The two teams combined for 68 turnovers, unfortunately for the Lady Cardinals, they had 43 as they wilted under the East Chambers pressure.

Thomas had 16 points and seven rebounds for the Lady Bucs. Bailey Kahla also had 16 points, scoring 11 of her points in the first half, including nine in the first quarter.

Austyn Daniels paced the Lady Cardinal attack with 14 points and a game-high nine rebounds.

The Lady Bucs jumped out to a 20-7 edge by the end of the first quarter by forcing Bridge City into 13 turnovers in the first eight minutes.

The Lady Cardinals slowly began to make up ground. Destiny Block and Daniels combined for nine points in the second quarter as Bridge City outscored the Lady Bucs 13-6 in the quarter to trim the margin to 26-20 by intermission. The Lady Cardinals forced East Chambers into nine turnovers in the second period.

The Lady Cardinals went on a 16-8 spurt in the third quarter to grab a 36-34 edge heading into the fourth. Block hit a three-pointer to tie it up at 30-30 and Huff drilled her two treys to give Bridge City a 36-30 edge.

The Lady Bucs’ Emmie Bauer scored the last four points in the third to trim the Lady Cardinal lead to two.

The Lady Buc full-court pressure, led by the long arms of Thomas, paid huge dividends in the fourth quarter as Thomas had four steals that led to easy layups.

East Chambers went on to force 14 Lady Cardinal turnovers in the final stanza to pull away.

Block and Huff each had eight points and five rebounds for the Lady Cardinals while Tara Aylor pulled down seven boards as Bridge City finished with a 33-31 rebounding edge.

Kenna Guillory had nine points and five rebounds for the Lady Bucs while Bauer finished with eight points and six boards and Leah Smith added seven points.

Both teams struggled from the free-throw line as the Lady Bucs made just 7-of-22 while the Lady Cardinals were just 2-of-7.

The Lady Cardinals will return to District 22-4A action next Tuesday when they host Silsbee. Bridge City is 3-1 in 22-4A play.