Colorado City Girls Stun No. 10 Ballinger

BALLINGER, TX — The No. 10-ranked Ballinger girls basketball team finished off the 2025 calendar year flying high with an 18-1 record.

The new year hasn’t been nearly as kind to the Lady Cats.

They’ve lost three of their four games to start 2026 — including a 53-48 upset loss Tuesday at home to Colorado City.

It was also Ballinger’s first game without starter Kyndal Rollwitz, who suffered a potentially season-ending knee injury last week.

The Lady Cats are now 19-4 overall with a 2-3 record in District 8-2A, and they have a game at first-place Coleman up next.

Ballinger head coach Nathan Riggan is hoping his team can rediscover its early-season form in a hurry.

“I felt like we were playing good going into the Christmas break, and I’m afraid we might’ve peaked a little too early,” Riggan said. “I mean, I was feeling real good going into the Christmas break, and then we kind of hit a little lull. …

“The good thing is we’ve got a whole ‘nother round of district, and hopefully we can keep things rolling offensively and find out where we made our main mistakes on defense, and hopefully get better from it and get ready for Coleman on Friday.”

Ballinger had 24 points Tuesday from Ysee Le Borgne, along with 18 points from Ashtyn Wilson. They combined for 42 of Ballinger’s 48 points.

The Lady Cats took a 44-34 lead into the fourth quarter, but they were outscored 19-4 in the final frame.

Colorado City’s Jaida Silva had a team-high 20 points and hit six 3-pointers, none bigger than a game-tying shot from the corner with 1:52 remaining to knot the score at 46-46.

Kezlye Strain had 19 points and knocked down a 3-pointer with 1:12 left to give the Lady Wolves a 49-46 lead.

Colorado City was clutch from the free-throw line from there, sinking 4 of 4 foul shots to seal the win.

“We knew it’d be a tough, scrappy game. They play really good defense,” Colorado City head coach Brandon Murray said of Ballinger. “I told the girls coming in, we just need to keep our composure. We can’t control what the refs do. We can’t control what other players do. We just need to control our emotions, and we’ll be fine. We kept chipping away at it, and fortunately we came away with a victory.”

Riggan said the loss of Rollwitz — Ballinger’s second-leading scorer and leader in steals — affected his team “big time.”

“It took a toll on us for sure,” Riggan said. “It was one of those deals where we needed to step up to fill that gap, and I felt like we did in some spots, and in others we did not.”

Ballinger’s three recent losses have been by a combined 12 points. They lost to Miles 27-26 and Roscoe 29-23.

It’s a balanced district in which the four playoff spots will have to be earned, and Ballinger is currently in fifth place with seven games remaining.

“You’ve just got to bring it every night,” Riggan said. “That’s why practice is so important, to work on the miscues you made the night before. … Tonight, we missed 12 free throws. In our three losses in district, the difference has been free throws. If we made at least half of those, we’d probably be undefeated in district right now, so it’s pretty self-inflicted I’d say.”

For Colorado City, Tuesday’s win was a big moment for a program that went 9-17 last year and missed the playoffs.

The Lady Wolves are now 15-12 overall and 3-2 in district, and they’re very much in the mix for a playoff spot.

“We have a core group of girls who’ve stuck with me the past three years,” Murray said. “They’ve really bought in, and they’ve helped the underclassmen buy into what we’re trying to do.

“Everyone’s beating everybody right now (in district), so it’s very competitive. I feel if we play how we’re supposed to play and make big shots when we need to and play good defense, I think we’ll get into one of those four spots in the playoffs.”

Colorado City will host Miles on Friday in a matchup of teams tied for third place.

Colorado City 53, Ballinger 48

Colorado City   12   9   13   19 — 53

Ballinger   18   14   12   4 — 48

COLORADO CITY — Jaida Silva 20, Kezlye Strain 19, Kaylynn Epperson 2, Lyla Ramon 12. 

BALLINGER — Ashtyn Wilson 18, Ysee Le Borgne 24, Braylin Quiroga 4, Harlee Mikalik 2.