jmetcalfe@delphosherald.com

ADA — The story of the Jefferson at Ada Northwest Conference girls basketball clash Thursday night inside “The Kennel” of Ada High School came down to one thing: shooting.

The host Lady Bulldogs canned 21-of-37 from the floor (1-of-9 long range) for 56.8 percent versus 17-of-47 for the Lady Wildcats (6-of-16 3s) for 36.1 percent in a 50-48 victory.

“We gave up way too much dribble penetration, especially the first half. We talked about that at halftime but we dug ourselves a big hole,”

Jefferson mentor Dave Hoffman said. “As well, our shooting the first half wasn’t too good; we didn’t have the best shot selection but we missed some pretty good ones, too.”

Despite the great shooting by his Bulldogs, Ada head man Neal Dumbaugh was focused on his team’s defense.

“I was disappointed in that area a lot tonight. We have had our moments all year of playing solid defense, just not tonight,” Dumbaugh added. “We gave up six 3s and many of them were wide open. We simply didn’t do a good job of keeping things in front of us. We also missed too many free trows that made things tougher than they should have been.”