By RYAN ARENA

Sports Editor

Cold shooting and rebounding issues plagued East St. John on Wednesday night as the Wildcats fell short against Thibodaux, 63-51.

The Tigers (7-3) gathered 44 rebounds to only 20 for the Wildcats (12-3). In addition, East St. John’s perimeter oriented attack mustered only five made 3-pointers — none by the usually lethal combo of Wanisha Creecy and Halle Lennix.

“You live by the three, you die by the three,” said East St. John Coach Troy Giordano. “If you can’t make your threes, you better bring the defensive pressure. We didn’t do that.”

Korielle Tucker led the Wildcats with 16 points. Mechel’le Thomas added 14.

Thibodaux led 34-28 at halftime, but pushed that lead to double digits in a third quarter that saw ESJ miss nine free throws.

“At halftime, it was anyone’s game. But that’s when we got in trouble,” said Giordano. “We get put in a situation where we’ve got to play catch up on the road.”

The Tigers pushed the lead to 52-42 after three quarters, and East St. John couldn’t close the gap.

Giordano said Thibodaux’s lineup presented some matchup issues for his team.

“They’ve got two tall girls down low, and two good guards that were able to take care of the ball and break our pressure,” he said. “We knew we had to shoot well and create points off our press, but they handled our pressure with ease.”

But when the team returns from a weeklong break to face South Lafourche on the road Tuesday, he wants to see more intensity from his team.

“I just thought we were sluggish the entire night. Lackadaisical. Every area we have to be good in to compete, we weren’t,” he said.