by Steve Bradley
The Lady Panthers had one slip away last Friday when Hoosic Valley sank a shot with less than one second left. The Indians headed back to Schaghticoke with a big win. The league leading Panthers got sloppy in the waning minutes to help the Indians cause. Hoosic Valley scored 13 points off turnovers, almost half their total, to the Pathers seven. Many of those critical turnovers came in the fourth quarter.[private]
Points were hard to come by for both teams. Hoosic Valley is notorious for their defense, and the Panthers matched them play for play. The great defense caused the Indians to force bad shots before the shot clock time expired. But even with the Panther Ladies holding HV to one point in the second quarter, the halftime score stood at 12-10, with the Panthers on the short end of the score.
The Panthers used the third quarter to build what appeared to be a bit of breathing room. Kelly Pine, the suddenly emerging Panthers best bet for making three-pointers, made three three-pointers to help pad the lead. By outscoring the Indians 14-5, an eight point lead looked almost insurmountable against the stingy Panther defense.
When the game moved into the fourth quarter, the Panthers got sloppy. Passes were a little off the mark, turnovers became frequent and the lead evaporated. Hoosic Valley had far more possessions than they should have and used them to chip away at the Panther lead.
Over the last five and one-half minutes of the game the Indians outscored the Panthers 9-5, mostly the result of Panther turnovers. Kelly Pine was called with her fourth foul and was sitting on the bench. With two minutes left in the game and the Panthers clinging to a two point, 26-24 lead, Anna Wysocki scored all four of her points over the last minutes and had the Panthers up 30 – 24. It looked as though the Panthers would hang on long enough for a win.
Then the Indians sank a three-pointer, banked in no less, and came back down to hit a two, putting the Indians within one point, 30-29. The Panthers got the ball but gave it right back when an errant pass resulted in another Indians possession with seven seconds left. Hoosic Valley quickly took a timeout.
The inbounds pass put the ball near the top of the key. The Panthers aggressively stopped the ball there and the ball was passed to the wing. The wing player got the ball and shot, with what had to be two-tenths of a second on the clock, and the ball dropped through the hoop from about 15 feet out. Everyone in the gym rooting for the home team slumped. It was good. There was no argument about it, it was a last second shot, and it was good. The undefeated in league play were undefeated no more.
Kelly Pine scored 17 points, hitting three of four three-pointers and six of nine from inside the arc. Hoosick Falls moved to 8-1 in league play, 12-2 overall. Hoosic Valley and Tamarac are tied at (L) 7-2, Cambridge (6-3), Stillwater (4-5), Mechanicville (3-8), Greenwich (2-7) and Granville (0-9).
HF 66- Mechanicville 37
Mechanicville HS, 1/13. The Ladies used a 24 point third quarter to pull away from the Mechanicville Red Raiders. After a first half that saw the Panthers up two at 26 – 24, the Ladies came out of the halftime break and took it to the Raiders. By the time the fourth quarter ended, with the Panthers outscoring the Raiders 16 – 3, the Panthers had put any hope the Raiders had of an upset completely out of reach. Kelly Pine had 17 points. Anna Wysocki had a big game with 16 points, Liz Ryan added 11 and Megan Flynn had 13 points and 16 rebounds.
Coming up, Friday, January 22, the Ladies will host Stillwater; on Friday, January 29, they will make the trip up Route 22 to play Granville. Both games start at 7:30 pm.[/private]