A nine-minute scoring drought throughout the middle two quarters of the game cost the second-seeded New Franklin girls a chance at their own tournament title on Saturday with a 47-30 loss to top-seeded Westran.

After they were held scoreless for the bottom half of the second quarter and the first five minutes of the third, the Lady Bulldogs scored just three points in the third period to enter the final stanza down by 11.

New Franklin cut it back to nine points briefly, but Westran outscored the Lady Bulldogs 13-3 over the next four minutes to clinch the championship.

“It’s disappointing, that’s for sure,” said New Franklin coach Parker Gross. “I hate losing. And you don’t want to lose on your home floor, ever. It felt like a great opportunity today to go in and compete. I thought we did that for the most part; we just missed a lot of shots, and they made a lot of shots.

“They shot the ball well, and when we had opportunities, we didn’t quite knock them down when we needed to.”

The two area rivals battled to two ties and two lead changes over a tight first quarter that finished with Westran ahead by just one point, 11-10. New Franklin pulled back ahead with a 7-2 scoring run over the first half of the second quarter. But the Bulldogs wouldn’t score again until senior Brynn Belstle sank one of two free-throw attempts with 3:13 on the clock in the third quarter. By then, Westran had built a double-digit lead.

“I didn’t think we played that poorly in that stretch,” Gross said. “I thought we took some good shots. We just didn’t knock them down. That’s a huge momentum shifter in a game like that.”

Entering the fourth quarter trailing 31-20, Gross said it still felt like a tight ballgame. The teams traded punches over the first three minutes, with Westran extending its lead by one point.

“We just couldn’t quite find a way to score,” Gross said.

Leading by 26, the Lady Hornets rattle off six straight points to go up by 20 points with 2:39 left. And while New Franklin was shooting, its trips down the court were often limited to just one shot as Westran gobbled up defense rebounds.

“I don’t feel like we did a good enough job getting in position to rebound. Even when we were, they were more aggressive to it,” said Gross. “We definitely didn’t give ourselves any second chances.”

New Franklin scoring leader Lily Chitwood paced her team as the only player in double figures with a game-high 13 points. She sank 3-pointers in each of the first two quarters but was off the court for a significant stretch in the second half with an ankle injury. She returned, sank a pair of field goals in the second half, and went 3-for-4 from the line in the fourth quarter.

Junior forward Skylar Shaw added five points, and freshman Belle Chitwood finished with four.

Senior Emma Wortman led Westran with 12 points, followed by juniors Kharigan Fuemmeler and Jaelyn Miller with nine each.

Coach Gross said that while he was disappointed with the loss, he is still proud that his team finished runner-up in its own tournament. The Bulldogs won two out of three games and knocked off third-seeded Community in the semifinals by a wide margin.

“I’m excited for the way that we played,” he said. “Especially Thursday night against Community. We did some good things tonight at both ends of the floor. We didn’t play poorly defensively for most of the game. And they made some tough shots at times.”

New Franklin is now 10-2 overall, with both losses coming at the hands of Westran. The first occurred in the opening round of the Glasgow Tournament on December 3. The Bulldogs were scheduled to travel to county rival Glasgow after the Advertiser went to press on Tuesday. On Friday, they host Community for a rematch and remain home against Pilot Grove next Tuesday. New Franklin travels to Harrisburg on Wednesday of next week to face the 10th-ranked team in Class 2.