PORTSMOUTH — The Ironton Lady Fighting Tigers showed how hard work makes things easy.

Ironton used a strong teamwork performance to generate an easy 58-28 win Tuesday over the Portsmouth Lady Trojans in a Southeastern Ohio Athletic League game.

“Shots are easier to make when you’re wide-open,” said Ironton coach Doug Graham. “We had great ball movement. We were coming off screens well. Give credit to the girls for finding the open man and being prepared to shoot.”

Graham was also impressed with Ironton’s total of 34 rebounds and 22 assists.

“It was a good team effort. We came out and executed what we’ve been practicing,” said Graham.

“We did a good job of rebounding. We’ve been working hard on boxing out. All the girls made an effort to box out.”

Ironton’s teamwork was evident by its balanced scoring that included three players in double figures.

Jessica Waddle had 16 points, freshman Alex Taylor scored 14, and Mercedes Crockrel had a triple-double with 10 points, 11 rebounds, and 10 assists.

Cassie Taylor scored 15 for Portsmouth (0-1).

Ironton raced to an 18-3 lead at the end of the first quarter and was up 28-7 on a layup by Lorna Ceasar off a pass from Crockrel with 2:38 left in the half.

Portsmouth closed to within 30-13 just before the end of the half, but Ironton went on a 10-2 run to begin the third quarter capped by Waddle’s layup to make it 40-15 with 4:18 on the clock.

Leading 42-34 at the end of the third quarter, Ceasar scored off a pass from Brea Tackett, Taylor sank two foul shots, and Waddle hit a 17-footer off a nice feed from Crockrel.

Crockrel and Waddle hit back-to-back layups and the lead grew to 52-23 with 4:28 to play.

Ironton (2-0, 1-0) will play at Marietta on Friday in a league game..