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The Albemarle women’s basketball team entered the second game of a tough two-game stretch Tuesday night.

Albemarle lost to 3A Terry Sanford on Dec. 7, 67-53, then went on the road to take on a Bishop McGuinness program which has 11 state championships to its credit.

The Bulldogs led early on a big second-quarter run, but a critical injury at the end of the third to the team’s leading scorer led Albemarle to its second straight loss, 57-48.

After a close first quarter, Albemarle (4-2) ended the second on an 11-2 run to lead by 10 at halftime, 33-23.

In the second half, Bishop (2-0) started connecting from the three-point arc. The host Villains trailed after three quarters, 41-38, but would take the lead in the fourth.

At the end of the third quarter, senior point guard Amari Baldwin took a shot at the buzzer at half court and landed on the foot of a Villain defender. She was carried off the court and did return but would finish with 14 points, well below her average points per game entering the contest of 29.6 ppg.

Jasmine Brown led Albemarle with 22 points.

For the Villains, Adelaide Jernigan led the hosts and all scores with 29 points, shooting 10-of-20 from the field including 6-of-14 from the three-point arc. In the game, Bishop was 13-of-33 from long distance.

“I am very proud of girls. Things like that happen in games and I’m proud of how they responded and executed,” Albemarle head coach Eric Davis said about the injury, adding Baldwin was “thankfully fine.”

“They have worked hard, and we as a community need to be very supportive and proud of them We are going to continue to work hard and get better every day so we are ready for a run in March.”