By ROBERT L. LEE

DESTREHAN – The Thibodaux Tigers may have lost a heart-breaker with their game prior to Destrehan, but it was up to them to attempt a bounce back in some way. The Fighting Wildcats prepared for a stronger Tiger team, then found it easy to open a 33-point lead at the half and a 29-point to win 93-64 Friday night.

“In district play, you can’t let that stuff make you lose a game,” said Destrehan’s coach Joe Schick.

Destrehan opened the first quarter, playing with power and overwhelming the still upset Tigers 28-11. The beating continued through the next eight minutes, as the Thibodaux again settled for 11 points while Destrehan pounded on another 27.

“We played real well in the first half. Thirty-three point lead, that’s self-explanatory,” added Schick. Despite the Fighting Wildcats’ leading scorer, Jaszmine Eugene, still out with an injury, Schick said the team continued stepping up and was firing on all cylinders.

“The defense jumped on them early and was getting some offense going and we were hitting all our shots early,” he said. Destrehan’s team decided it was a disadvantage for the Tigers, but they were not going to go easy on them, because when the Fighting Wildcats travel down to Thibodaux, they’re at a disadvantage as well. Added to the disadvantage, Schick listed three strong points where his team excelled.

“We came out with a high intensity, good defense and were hitting all our shots,” he explained. “There wasn’t many teams who could have beat us that night. Especially in Destrehan.”

Along with these three aspects, Schick named three players, who also raised their bar of performance and gave the team an added lift Friday night.

He said senior guard Richard Jones and sophomore forward Donald Pollard have had more intensity than ever and junior center Lonnie Vasquez has been shooting extremely well.

“Sometimes an injury on the team is a blessing in disguise,” said Schick.

“When Eugene gets back, we’ll have even more of an offense.”

The stellar offense and defense put smiles on everyone’s faces in the Destrehan locker room, as the players and coaches enjoyed their 55-22 lead.

“It was kind of hard to get on them at halftime. Even I was smiling a lot,” admitted Schick. “Although I think they might have been too lose. But, I told them we have to go back out with the same intensity.”

Destrehan’s relaxed intensity allowed a revitalized Thibodaux to come back into the third and outscore the Fighting Wildcats 19-17, although it had no effect on Destrehan’s lead.

Schick said his defense didn’t play the same as in the first half and players gave a little too many points away, but linked some it to all the substitutions he was rotating in, giving the junior varsity guys some playing time.

“They really picked it up in the second half,” said Schick. “But down that much, they could’ve done one of two things, give up or be pissed off. They were pissed off and came back to play harder.”

Thibodaux’s determination resulted in outscoring Destrehan again by two points in the fourth quarter, 23-21, but again, it had no effect and the final buzzer sounded with the home team ahead 93-64.

Schick said Thibodaux should have seen the match as another game they had to win, largely because they have one of the worst records. He said their record, now 12-10 and 3-5 in district, stems from being a young team.

“We beat them bad earlier over there,” he added.

“They are easy to overlook, so I told our players we had to keep our usual pace and focus if we want to win district.

“We can’t worry about big games like Hahnville before these smaller games. If we do and lose the small game, we’d be in a bad position.”

Destrehan’s next game will be against another set of Tigers Friday, Feb. 1 at Hahnville.