PHOTOS BY RICHARD AKRIDGE Senior Makayla Valles takes an off-balance shot during the Lady Badgers’ loss to Faith Academy Tuesday evening. The Lady Badgers wanted to rebound from a disappointing loss.

Instead, they got a letdown.

After leading by five points late in the third quarter, Lampasas watched the Faith Academy Lady Flames secure a 35-27 road victory by going on a 16-3 run to close out the contest.

The Lady Badgers missed all eight of their field-goal attempts in the fourth quarter and did not score until guard Kayla Prescott connected on a free throw with less than a minute on the clock.

“It was close until the fourth quarter,” Lampasas head coach Stuart Beckwith said. “We were executing pretty well, not great, but pretty well, [and then] in the fourth quarter we just shut it down.”

Although the Lady Badgers struggled offensively during the final eight minutes, they were not alone.

Madison Morris looks for an open teammate against the Lady Flames. The junior finished with three rebounds, two steals and an assist. Faith Academy was just two of six from the field but had a reversal of fortune at the charity stripe, where it scored each of its final eight points. The Lady Flames missed their first 10 freethrow attempts.

“I can’t take anything away from them. They’re 12-3, and they’ve beat a lot of people,” Beckwith said of the opposing team. “The bottom line is we were better. It’s silly to say because we didn’t win, but we just didn’t get the job done.

“When it came down to it, we didn’t execute offensively.”

The loss was the team’s second consecutive after it fell by four points to Houston Second Baptist in the consolation championship game of the Burnet tournament.

Post Lauren Barlow’s shot is blocked by a Lady Flames defender. Despite the defense, the senior scored a team-high 12 points to go with a gamehigh 11 rebounds. Lampasas jumped out to an early lead to start the contest against Faith Academy. Senior guard Makayla Valles put the home team ahead 4-0 after getting a steal and taking it down the court for a layup.

The teams traded baskets before the Lady Flames drained back-toback 3-pointers, including a firstquarter buzzer-beater by Kendra Field that knotted the score at 8-8.

In the second quarter, both teams went cold from the floor. Lampasas hit one of 10 shots in the period, and Faith Academy was two-of-eight shooting from the field but held a slim 13-12 advantage at halftime.

“I thought it was still the first quarter,” Beckwith said. “[When] I looked up and saw we had 12 points, I didn’t think we could have played a whole half.

“We missed so many easy shots. We couldn’t buy a basket there for a while.”

Lampasas went scoreless for a full four minutes before Madison Morris scored off a pass from Hailey Morrison to put the Lady Badgers up 12-10. The visitors responded quickly, however, as Shiloh Reaves banked in a 3- pointer to put her team back in control.

After the break, the Lady Badgers had their best scoring performance, hitting six of 16 shots to score a dozen points in the third quarter.

Senior Lauren Barlow tallied eight of her team-high 12 points in the period, but it was Kallen Vann’s long jumper that gave Lampasas its biggest lead of the evening at 24- 19.

Then the Lady Badgers broke down.

Faith Academy trimmed the margin to 24-23 by the end of the period before extending its 12- point unanswered streak into the fourth quarter.

The Lady Flames took control for good with 4:45 left in the game, as Brooke Field tallied the first field goal of the quarter for either team.

The back-breaker came moments later when, after missing two consecutive free throws, Kendra Field grabbed her own rebound and was fouled again. That sent her back to the line where she hit both free throws, and the Lady Flames pushed their lead to 29-24 with 2:05 remaining.

“The times they missed, we didn’t rebound, and the times we got fouled, we didn’t make our free throws,” Beckwith said. “That’s pretty much the difference in the game.”

The Lady Badgers were five of 11 from the free-throw line and missed four of their seven attempts in the final minute of the contest. One of the makes came after a miss was negated due to a Faith Academy lane violation.

Led by Barlow’s game-high 11 boards, Lampasas narrowly won the rebounding battle 25-24.

The Lady Badgers (4-9) play their final home game until 2010 tonight when they host Burnet. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m.

Both subvarsity squads will play at 5:15 p.m.