BROSELEY -- Campbell went into the locker room trailing East Carter by nine points. The message coach Laura Foster gave her team at the half was a simple but effective one: push forward and fight back.
The Lady Camels did exactly that, slimming the deficit little by little in the second half. Junior Adrionna Pearson scored 10 straight points, including a 3-pointer at the buzzer in the third quarter to tie the game for the first time since the opening tip.
"(Pearson) has really been working on that, and she needed a game like tonight," Foster said. "We knew we were going to have to have her this year, especially as an inside threat, so she definitely showed that she's put in the work."
Senior Claire Parker gave Campbell the lead for the first time as soon as the fourth quarter started, and with the game tied at 45 with 27 seconds left, she drew a foul and knocked down a pair of free throws to secure a 47-45 win for the Lady Camels.
With the win, 11th-seeded Campbell advances to the semifinal of the consolation bracket to face 10th-seeded Charleston at 1:30 p.m. on Friday.
"My mom always tells me to keep my elbow in when I shoot, so I was just thinking I have to make one, at least one," Parker said.
Campbell (4-3) took its first lead of the game when Parker finished a coast-to-coast layup in transition after coming up with a steal in the backcourt to start the fourth quarter.
"Our team really loves to win," Parker said. "So, We hit a couple of shots right at the beginning (of the second half) and then our defense just goes off that, but we just like to run and go with the ball."
That lead swelled to its peak at seven points when Lauren Weidenbenner drained a corner 3 to finish off a 12-0 run. East Carter (3-3) quickly responded with five quick points from a putback by Bailey Gargac and a 3-pointer in the corner from freshman Jordan Moore.
Moore had the hot hand for the Lady Redbirds all night. She scored a game-high 20 points on nine made shots. The Lady Camels slowed Moore down by briefly switching to a box-and-one defense, having the player who wasn't playing a zone to shadow Moore and try to deny her the ball. Prior to that switch, Moore had stretches of scoring seven straight points and six points. She was driving around the defense, knocking down floaters and hitting mid-range jumpers.
"As a coach, it was super frustrating because we thought we had things that were in place and it just wasn't happening and we weren't reading where we were supposed to go at the right time," Foster said. "We're notorious for coming in slow this year, and that is frustrating as a coach."
The team's defense was stifling at times, too. Campbell didn't score for the first five minutes of the game, and its first field goal wasn't until the 1:20 mark of the first quarter, trailing by as many as 12 points in the first half.
"We were seeing the floor, we were rebounding, we were passing well, all of the things we've been working on because we usually have a lot of unforced turnovers, and we came out and decided to stop doing those things," East Carter coach Angela Rodgers said.
When Moore was slowed down and Campbell had regrouped at halftime, East Carter had trouble getting into the flow of its offense and playing its aggressive style of defense. Audrey Carter was the only other Lady Redbird in double figures with 12 points.
Parker was the driving force of the Campbell offense down the stretch. She scored the last six points for the Lady Camels, all of which were at the free-throw line, including the game-winning pair.
Carter almost helped the Lady Redbirds survive. She scored a layup to pull her team within two points, and tied the game with under 30 seconds left on a pull-up jumper inside the paint.
Quarterfinals
New Madrid 57, Chaffee 25
New Madrid's defense held Chaffee (6-4) to two points in the second quarter and a point in the third, preserving its undefeated season with a 57-25 victory over Chaffee. The win sets up a meeting with Neelyville in the winner's bracket of the Lady Royals Classic.
Alivia Hartman led the game with 20 points for the Lady Eagles (10-0). Hartman's scoring production was balanced in each quarter with six points in the first, five in the second, six in the third and three in the fourth. Ayannah Ruff scored 17 points to give the offense a boost, including the team's only triple of the game.
The first quarter was fairly close, though. New Madrid led 16-12 after the first eight minutes before its defense clamped down and allowed 13 points for the rest of the game. The Lady Eagles did the majority of their damage inside the arc, making one 3-pointer and 24 deuces.
Grace Knutson led Chaffee's offense with nine points.
Both teams were able to play defense without fouling for the majority of the night. Chaffee committed nine fouls to New Madrid's eight.
Third-seeded New Madrid will meet second-seeded Neelyville at 7:30 p.m. Friday with a trip to the final on the line.