No longer dead in the water

The South Lafourche girls’ basketball team was beaten down, heartbroken and most importantly 0-3 in district.

They had suffered both internal and external adversity – enough that could divide and ultimately rip a team apart at the seams.

And that’s exactly what most expected of South Lafourche, who were looked at as dead fish in the water that is the Bayou District chase.

The exact opposite happened – with now nothing to lose and everything to gain, South Lafourche started fighting back.

And it now seems their early season struggles are a thing of the past – and a possible playoff berth is a thing of the future.

Since their tumultuous start to the season, the Lady Tarpons have rallied, carrying a five-game winning streak into the second round of district play to make them arguably the hottest team in the Tri-parish area.

“We had some unfortunate circumstances at the beginning of our district run,” Lady Tarpons coach Lonnie Griffin said. “But everybody got their thoughts about them and their wits about them and we started going to work.”

The “unfortunate circumstances” Griffin referenced were multi-fold for South Lafourche.

The Lady Tarpons lost their coach just into the start of district play, as Terry Farmer resigned after the team’s first district game for unspecified reasons.

With transition came struggle, as South Lafourche fell to 0-3 to start district play. To make matters worse, the Lady Tarpons were never badly beaten, suffering one heartbreaker after another, as the three losses came by just a combined six points.

Add that to an already young roster that features just a few seniors and South Lafourche admittedly sometimes struggled to hold it all together in the face of disappointment.

“That was very, very frustrating to us,” senior Andrea Brunet said. “It was hard to go to practice the next day and to keep going sometimes after losing so many close ones, but we always knew we had it in us to make things right and to turn our season around.”

Griffin agreed and said he and his coaching staff stressed to the team that better days would be ahead if the Lady Tarpons just didn’t give up and played hard throughout the 12-game district schedule.

After all, South Lafourche’s three losses were against Thibodaux, Central Lafourche and Terrebonne – all of whom are year-in and year-out among the top of the pack in the Bayou District.

“Anytime you open up your district like that, that’s three pretty tough teams,” Griffin said. “Going 0-3 to them with an accumulated points of just six, we knew we were right there all along.”

Apparently both Griffin and Brunet’s prognostications were dead on the money.

The Tarpons got in the win column in district play for the first time on Jan. 11 in a 50-15 win against South Terrebonne in Bourg.

From there, they earned a home win against H.L. Bourgeois 36-24 just three nights later to up their record to 2-3, while also ultimately upping their confidence level.

“We knew we weren’t ever going to give up,” senior Alyssa Lafont said. “Getting those first few wins did help us to see the reasons why.”

From that two-game win streak, the Tarpons had another perfect week the following week, topping Assumption and Thibodaux both on the road to make them 4-3.

Last Tuesday, they got their fifth-straight and arguably their biggest win, beating Central Lafourche 41-30 – the same Lady Trojans who helped get South Lafourche off on the wrong foot Dec. 17 in a 29-28 setback in Mathews.

That win helped South Lafourche see just how far their improvements have come, but also moved the team into second place in the Bayou District – an awfully far cry from an 0-3 start.

“We wanted to beat Central very, very badly,” Lafont said. “We wanted to make up for that first game.”

Griffin agreed and said being in second place is a place he’s happy to be.

Now, he wants to see how the Lady Tarpons will play with the bulls-eye on their backs.

“I’m anxious to see how the girls play with it now,” Griffin said. “It’ll be hard to catch Terrebonne. They’d have to really take a slide. But we like where we are.”

Where the Tarpons are now is certainly better than where the Tarpons have been and with just four games to go, both Griffin and his players see the playoffs in the team’s future if things continue to go well.

Two teams in every district advance each year to postseason play.

Right now the Tarpons would be one of those two.

Not bad for a team who started 0-3, changed coaches and had to overcome youth while playing in one of the most competitive districts in Louisiana.

“I’m very excited,” Griffin said. “We’re all anxious to see exactly how this turns out.”

South Lafourche senior Alyssa Lafont glides through the air for a floater during last Tuesday’s game against Central Lafourche. The Lady Tarpons defeated the Lady Trojans, extending their district winning streak to five games. CASEY GISCLAIR