The George Rogers Clark girls basketball team faced another tough task when they took on defending state champions Ryle Saturday afternoon.

The Lady Cardinals were bounced from last year’s state tournament by the Lady Raiders and were looking for revenge on their home floor.

It was Clark County’s first game after playing in one of the state’s top tournaments, the Queen of the Commonwealth. The tournament featured nine teams ranked in the coaches’ preseason poll, including GRC, who finished the tournament in fourth place.

The game began with the Lady Raiders on fire from downtown, draining six 3-pointers in the opening half while they jumped out to a 39-23 lead by halftime.

The Lady Cardinals’ best basketball came during the opening minutes of the second half. They scored the first eight points of the third quarter to cut their deficit in half. They held the Lady Raiders scoreless in the first four minutes of the quarter.

Ryle would end another Lady Cardinals run and take control of the game in the remaining minutes of the third quarter and led 53-38 at the start of the fourth quarter.

“We’ve got to be more consistent. We’re playing hard in spurts and we’ve got to play hard for 32 minutes,” GRC head coach Robbie Graham said after the game. “The biggest thing is we’re not rebounding well. That’s always been a staple of us. We’ve been a great rebounding team even though we haven’t had a lot of great size at times. We’re just not going to get it and we’re allowing them to be the aggressor on the offensive side. They’re getting second, third possessions and it makes it tough when you give teams three shots at it. So we’re going to work at that, get better at that.”

The Lady Cardinals gave up 29 rebounds to the defending state champs in the game, a disadvantage that would put them too far out of reach in the game’s final minutes. The Lady Cardinals fell 68-50 in their revenge game against Ryle, but Graham isn’t worried about his team despite their record early in the year.

“We’re only nine games in, so there’s no panic button here, but we’ve got to get better though. We’ve got to keep working and keep getting better,” Graham said. “Our schedule’s been brutal, which is for a reason. We want to play tough teams. The Bullitt East tournament was all ranked-teams. Ryle’s record is no indication of how good they are, they haven’t been healthy. But it’s just going to make us better. We want to be playing our best basketball come tournament time. We want to be battle-tested. Right now, we’ve been beat up, banged up a little bit. But we’re going to go to our practice sessions and keep working.”