Though Hahnville earned a District 7-5A opening victory over Destrehan last week, consecutive losses to Terrebonne and East Ascension have represented a bump in the road for the Tigers — though they have a chance to leave it in the dust behind them this Friday night.
The Tigers will be hosting Thibodaux, the top-ranked team in the Class 5A power point rankings and one of the biggest hurdles for Hahnville in its hunt for a district championship.
“They spread the court with five who can all shoot,” said Hahnville coach Yussef Jasmine. “Defensively, we have to stay solid. Given who we’ve played already this year, I think we’ve seen a little bit of everything, and I think we match up well. It’ll be at our place and it’ll be a big game. We just need to get it done.”
The Tigers are 13-9 and in the midst of its first true rough patch of the season, though the competition has been stout, going 4-4 over their last eight.
Tuesday night’s loss at East Ascension came without the services of point guard Dylan Lorio, who suffered a broken nose at practice. Lorio is expected to return Friday night but was held out against East Ascension, and Jasmine said it made a tough challenge that much greater in a 75-55 loss.
“We couldn’t control the pace without him,” Jasmine said. “We didn’t play well and it kind of snowballed on us.”
Against Terrebonne, it was a case of a slow start dooming the Tigers in a 70-61 loss, who were two days removed from scoring an emotional rivalry win over Destrehan.
The latter win came by a 82-76 score and saw Hahnville in a contrasting spot from the East Ascension loss: this time, the Tigers were able to control the tempo, and pushed the pace early and often against the defensive-minded Wildcats.
“Usually (Destrehan) plays a more methodical game, we were able to speed them up and that was the difference. We had a few guys step up in a big way for us,” Jasmine said.
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