There were times that neither team played well enough to win, but throughout the Scarborough-Windham girls basketball game last Saturday night, it was apparent that neither team wanted to lose. In the end, the Red Storm rallied for a 54-50 overtime home win against a pesky and determined Eagles squad.
Scarborough opened the game with solid play at both ends of the floor to take a quick 5-0 lead thanks to baskets from Abby Pelletier and Sarah Bonenfant. The Red Storm had several opportunities to increase that advantage, but they missed some scoring chances and turned the ball over.
Windham responded with three straight hoops (from Kelly Dubay, Stacey Niedoroda, and Riley Graves) to pull ahead by one and the game see-sawed back and forth until the Storm took a 13-12 lead into the second period.
Everyone on the floor was contributing, with Scarborough baskets coming from Jenn Colpitts, Heather Carrier, Melissa Bell and Christy Manning, while Windham had buckets from Kelsey McGowan and Kelsey Babb.
A three-pointer by Bonenfant with 1:10 left in the second quarter was the final scoring of the first half and the Red Storm went to the break with a 23-18 advantage.
If Scarborough thought they had the momentum to close out the first half, Windham immediately stole that momentum at the start of the third quarter. The Eagles opened the second half with 10 unanswered points to pull ahead 28-23. Steals by Jenna Willey and Helen Libby turned into easy layups. Hard work under the boards produced a pair of foul shots by Graves and two more baskets from Libby and McGowan forced the Storm to call a timeout and re-group.
“I think our defense stepped up and started to play more aggressive – a trapping defense that we’ve been working on,” said Windham coach Jessie Mayol, explaining how the Eagles took the lead. “We set a goal at halftime that we wanted to win the third quarter. They came out and for the first time all year (we did win the third quarter).”
Scarborough stopped the bleeding with a three-point play from Pelletier and they added baskets from Reegan Brackett and Bonenfant to close out the quarter trailing by a single point at 33-32.
Neither team gained more than a four-point lead the rest of the way. A basket by Graves was matched by free throws from Brackett and Carrier. A drive by Libby was met with a score from Pelletier. And so it went until Windham grabbed a 46-42 lead with less than two minutes to play after a pair of free throws by Libby and another score from Graves.
Pelletier scored on a putback to get the Storm within 46-44. A Windham free throw was followed by a Brackett free throw and the score stood at 47-45. Scarborough fouled and the Eagles missed both free throws, giving the Storm one last chance to tie the score.
An inbounds play to Manning under the basket looked like the answer. Manning’s first shot was partially blocked and she was fouled on her second attempt with 1.7 seconds left on the clock. She calmly made both shots from the charity stripe to send the game into overtime at 47-47.
Manning made two more free throws to start the extra session and she added a key steal (as did Carrier and Bonenfant) to hold off the Eagles for the 54-50 win.
“I think they’re slowing seeing that they can compete. I think we’re going to surprise some people this year,” Mayol said about her young squad that includes just one senior.
On Tuesday evening, the Eagles dropped a 48-33 decision to Westbrook. The Blazes out-scored the Eagles 26-15 in the second half. Riley Graves led Windham with 21 points.
On Friday, the Eagles host undefeated South Portland at 7 p.m.
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