Cody Almond says the Sabine Pass Lady Sharks have never been this good. If his girls can perform on offense the same way they do on defense, then good things will happen for them.

“We’ve accomplished a lot more than a lot of people give us credit for,” Almond said. “I think everybody thought this season was going to have the same old Sabine Pass basketball team, and that has not been the case. If we play our game and we go out there (Thursday) night 100 percent positive, we could come away with a second round win.”

The Sharks (17-5) defeated their first playoff opponent Colmesneil Tuesday 44-31 in their Class 2A bi-district game at Deweyville High School. Sabine Pass started strong with a 9-0 run, in part due to the strength of its defense and with points from the fast break. The Bulldogs are a good shooting team,Almond said, but the Sharks’ defense kept them at bay, which helped make up for a more mild offensive performance from the Sharks.

“Our offense wasn’t 100 percent but when you only give up 30 points that’s OK,” Almond said. “That’s what helps us to win the game. Those 44 aren’t a bad thing, but if we were doing on the offensive end what we were on the defensive end, we could have scored a lot more. What we need for the next game is to learn from that and be better on the offensive end, along with the defensive end and good things will happen.”

The Sharks next play Shelbyville at 6 p.m. tonight at Kirbyville.

The No. 3 seed from District 22-2A defeated District 21 runner-up Cushing 70-48 on Monday in its bi-district playoff game.

“We’ve got a couple of films on them,” Almond said of the Dragons. “At this stage no one’s easy. They’re fast and they can shoot. They’re kind of like our style of team — they get up and down the court, knock good shots down and all is well. They play good defense and we play good defense, so it should be a fairly even matchup.”

Shelbyville is 28-6 overall and 10-4 in district. The Dragons were knocked out in the second round of last year’s playoffs by Hull-Daisetta after losing 62-57 in overtime.

“They have really good guard players,” he said. “They can shoot, they can dribble, they can take care of the ball. It’s going to be a challenge finding a way to stop that on defense, getting a hand in their face on the wing, double teaming, trapping on press, making them uncomfortable to get them to cough up the ball.

“We’re just long and we’re fast, we cut passing lanes and we’ve just always been the fastest team. If we’re running 100 percent and not stopping, our defense will figure out a way to make other teams uncomfortable.”

Sabine Pass boys

The Sharks lost to Deweyville on Tuesday 69-53 but nonetheless enter the playoffs as 24-2A’s No. 2 seed with a record of 4-4 and 17-16 overall. They’ll play the winner of Friday’s seeding game between 23-2A’s West Sabine and Zavalla. The date, time and location of the playoff game hadn’t been decided yet.

“Some of the teams in our district have played both West Sabine and Zavalla, and I’ve got a little bit of a scouting report on them,” Sabine Pass coach Chad Bryan said. “I’m going to watch their seeding game on Friday so I have an idea of what they’re going to do to us.”

As a top seed, Bryan says he’s feeling confident that the Sharks may get a win in the postseason. The last time the Sabine Pass boys team won a playoff game was in 2015.

“That’ll be good for the seniors, they’ll be excited, and I’m pretty junior heavy this year so that will give them something to motivate them coming back next year, having a little postseason success,” Bryan said.