In a battle of women-coached boys basketball teams, Porters Chapel’s E.J. Creel saw her team have a big second half to down visiting Benton 49-36 in a District 5-A game Thursday night at PCA.

The Eagles (7-3, 6-3 in district) avenged an earlier defeat to the Raiders, who are coached by Tamra Vandevere.

“Yeah, you don’t see that too often,” Vandevere said of the matchup of two women coaches, squaring off in boys varsity game.

But like any other basketball game, the team that got the hot hand shooting in the second half, won. That would be the Eagles, who connected on 50 percent of their shots (14-of-28) in the second half to turn a six-point deficit into a 13-point win.

“I wish we could start the game like we did there in the third quarter,” Creel said as her Eagles got 11 third-quarter points from Jacob Rachal to outscore the Raiders 19-6. “We just can’t seem to get out of the gate. We’re just so slow in starting.

“Tonight, we were coming off a big vacation and haven’t practiced as much as I would’ve liked. But we did move the ball faster in the second half.”

The Eagles were able to move the ball inside to the 6-foot-4 Rachal, who made five of seven shots in the quarter to go with five rebounds. When he got covered, he bounced the ball back out to Matt Cranfield, who knocked down a pair of shots in the quarter.

Rachal brought the Eagles even at 24 with a conventional three-point play two minutes deep into the third quarter. Then another Rachal basket and one by Luke Willis put the Eagles ahead. Cranfield closed out the quarter, scoring off a long pass from Rachal after a blocked shot from Jeremaine O’Conner to make it 33-26.

Benton (5-9) could make just 7-of-26 shots in the second half and made 12 turnovers.

“You can’t win doing that,” Vandevere said. “We missed too many layups.”

Brad Pennington scored all seven of his points in the fourth quarter to boost PCA into a double-digit lead.

Rachal finished with 16 points and 10 rebounds. Cranfield had 13 while O’Conner had six points, six rebounds and four blocks in just over two quarters. Luke Willis had six points and snagged eight steals.

Jordan Davis led Benton with nine points.

(G) Benton 46, PCA 38

Benton had just six players dressed but it was enough to beat PCA (2-11, 2-7) by eight. Ashley Boatner led the Lady Raiders (7-8) with 18 points. Katie Carr had 14.

Shelby Wells led PCA with 18 points. The Lady Eagles trailed by just three at the half, 22-19, but could not make any further comeback in the second half.