It had been a minute since the West Lincoln girls’ basketball team faced some adversity.

The team is 24-1 and went 8-0 during Region 7-2A regular season play.

Saturday night, on their home court inside Jack Case Gymnasium, the once defeated group of green and white wearing Bears faced adversity in the form of the visiting Bogue Chitto Bobcats.

BC junior center De’Mya Porter grabbed her own rebound and got a putback that cut the West Lincoln lead to 40-39 with under two minutes left in the Region 7-2A Tournament Championship.

West Lincoln didn’t panic though. They called back to times they held on late last season in similar situations.

When the final horn sounded, West Lincoln captured the first place trophy by a 46-39 final score. It was the sixth straight region tournament title for Flea Hop.

To say the gym was packed with fans from both schools doesn’t do justice to how scarce open seats were.

After the boys’ consolation finished, West Lincoln officials started letting one fan in for every fan that left. Few fans left, so few new fans got in.

BC led 12-11 after the first quarter but trailed 23-16 at halftime.

What stopped Bogue Chitto was turnovers as the Bobcats had a pile of them that robbed possessions from the visiting team.

Bogue Chitto had a turnover on the first possession of the game and then opened the third quarter with a turnover to start the period.

WL senior guard Kara Beth Addison picked off an errant pass, drove to the basket and then found senior Ramsey Hall under the goal, alone for a layup.

Bogue Chitto started looking inside in the third quarter as it began to chip away at the lead.

Porter called for the ball on the block and scored on a turnaround at the bucket to cut the Bear advantage to 34-28.

It was the deepest in the paint that Porter had received a pass all night and one of the few times that she wasn’t doubled by West Lincoln defenders when she touched the ball.

Later in the second half, Porter blocked a shot and then gathered the ball and dribbled the length of the court with a WL defender on her hip.

When a second player cut her off at the block, Porter found a wide-open Destinee Thompson for a layup that made the score 38-37. West Lincoln head coach Alissa Adams called a timeout with 3:24 left in the fourth quarter as the Bogue Chitto contingent roared with excitement.

The lone loss of the season for West Lincoln came on Nov. 10 at Madison-Ridgeland Academy. Since then, the Bears had won 20 games in a row before Friday.

The average margin of victory during that win streak was 31 points.

West Lincoln lost in the MHSAA 2A semifinals last season to Belmont High School.

The team won some close games with late-game, heady play on multiple occasions last season while making their run to the Mississippi Coliseum.

They beat Velma Jackson by five at home in the quarterfinals and held off Kemper County by three points at home in the second round.

With fiver seniors starting and another senior as the first sub off the bench, the team only needed to tap into its memories from last season to get things done late against Bogue Chitto.

“My kids know what we want to do with the ball in late game situations,” said Adams. “We work a lot on putting time on the clock and practicing what we’ll do if we’re down a certain amount late or if we’re up by so many points late in a game. I think that pays off the stretch for us.”

West Lincoln took care of the basketball and Addison made four straight free-throws to ice the win.

Addison finished 19-of-20 from the free throw line and scored a game high 29 points.

Senior forward Ta’Kyla “Moosy” Brothern battled foul trouble most of the night and scored four points. Hall scored six points as did Mary Clarie Johnson. Madilyn Case rounded out the WL scoring with two points.

West Lincoln will host Nanih Waiya (6-19) on Monday in the first round of the MHSAA playoffs. Bouge Chitto will host Newton High (10-11). Loyd Star (8-17), who lost 50-49 to Amite County (7-18) in the consolation game, will travel to Lake High (19-9).

Porter scored 13 points for Bogue Chitto. Her biggest impact was on the defensive end where the 6-foot-1 Porter blocked six shots.

BC went 6-of-17 from the free throw line and committed 25 turnovers in the loss.

Senior guard Fayth Magee made three 3-pointers for the Bobcats and finished with nine points. Junior Tykeria May chipped in 11 points and point guard Neeli Magee added four points.

Bogue Chitto coach Marc Howard started one senior in Fayth Magee, a freshman in Thompson, a sophomore in Neeli Magee and two juniors — May and Porter.

For West Lincoln, the six seniors— Addison, Brothern, Hall, Laird, Johnson and Mailey Kate Young —became contributors as freshmen under former coach Brooks Smith

They end their careers against Region 7-2A competition — including games played in the Lincoln County Tournament — with an all-time combined record of 45-2.

“They just refuse to lose,” said Adams. “You could see it in their eyes that they knew what it was going to take to win this one tonight once our lead went away.”