WINNIE – Controlling the second half, the Tarkington Lady Longhorns outlasted the Little Cypress-Mauriceville Lady Bears 61-50 in the Class 4A Region III bidistrict playoffs Monday night at East Chambers High School.

The Lady Longhorns (18-16), the runnerups out of District 21-4A, outscored the Lady Bears (22-11), the third-place team out of 22-4A, 37-23 in the second half after they trailed 27-24 at intermission.

The Lady Bears scrapped hard but couldn’t get it going on the offensive end in the second half.

LC-M certainly didn’t help itself from the free-throw line as they converted just 8-of-27 shots from the charity stripe.

The Lady Longhorns also turned up the defensive pressure after intermission that bothered the Lady Bears.

The Tarkington win offset a superb performance from LC-M junior point guard Chelsea Perry, who produced a nice double-double. Perry, thanks to her slashing driving ability filtered in a game-high 21 points to go along with 10 rebounds.

Senior Lady Bear post Karly Rogers was the other player in double figures as she finished with 10 points and nine rebounds.

Zaria Johnson had seven points for the Lady Bears while Britney Wyatt contributed six points and seven rebounds.

The Lady Longhorns were paced by forward Sydney Whitmire. Whitmire had the knack for driving in and using the glass to her advantage as she led Tarkington with 18 points to go along with five rebounds.

Guard Madison Bunfill popped for 11 points and had five steals. Savannah Boyd collected 10 points while post Kathia Precindo had eight points and a team-high seven rebounds.

Bunfill and Whitmire led the second-half surge for the Longhorns as both scored nine points in the final 16 minutes.

Perry tried to keep the Lady Bears in it after intermission by scoring 11 points in the second half.

Tarkington jumped out of the gate fast, grabbing a 10-3 lead but the Lady Bears closed the first period with a 6-0 run to pull to within one.

The Lady Bears outscored Tarkington 18-14 in the second quarter as Perry muscled her way on nice drives to score eight in the period while Rogers tallied four points to help the Lady Bears snag the three-point lead at the half.

Whitmire had nine points in the half for Tarkington while Boyd had six.

Tarkington’s biggest lead came with 2:56 remaining at 57-44 after a Bunfill bucket.

The Lady Bears scrambled back to get as close as 57-50 on a nice drive by guard Brielle Butler with 1:38 left.

The Lady Bears finished with a 35-28 rebounding edge. LC-M had 21 turnovers while Tarkington had 19.

The Lady Longhorns finished 11-of-17 from the free-throw line.