The third quarter of Chilton Christian Academy’s varsity girls basketball matchup with Tuscaloosa Christian on Dec. 12 is one that the Patriots would like to have back, and a major reason why CCA lost 47-32.

Both teams proved to be evenly matched in many facets of the game and the result was a 15-all tie at halftime.

However, Tuscaloosa was the first team to break through the defensive affair and outscored CCA 17-6 in the third quarter and built a double-digit lead.

According to senior captain Kim Hagler, part of the struggles in the third quarter were due to one of the team’s lockdown defenders, Hannah Littleton, spraining her ankle during the quarter.

With Littleton favoring her ankle and having to leave the game, it caused a void defensively that CCA had a difficult time masking.

Helping to spur Tuscaloosa’s third quarter run was the ability to find ways to get to the free throw line.

Limiting the fouls is something that Patriots will continue to work on as the season moves along.

“We get very excited when we start doing well, and then we start fouling,” Hagler said. “It’s really just about reading off of each other and not swatting [at the ball].”

The scoring eventually picked up for CCA in the fourth quarter, but the Patriots were unable to climb back from the deficit that it had created heading into the final eight minutes of play.

Hagler plays at the guard position alongside her sister Emily Hagler.

The siblings have been playing with each other for years and when things were clicking on the court, you could see their strong relationship come to the forefront.

“It’s easy to play off of each other,” Kim Hagler said. “We can just look at each other and know.”

On the night, the guards were able to take advantage of some turnovers and convert them into breakaways and the opportunity for transition points.

“We’ve all learned to shoot and work the ball around a lot better than we did last year,” Kim Hagler said.

Emily Hagler led the Patriots with a team-high 17 points.

At halftime, CCA eighth grader Noah Brooker completed four Rubik’s Cubes in less than two minutes, as the crowd cheered him on.