CLAREMONT – The Stevens Cardinals girls had a chance to rebound from their 1-3 start as they hosted a 3-1 Oyster River team on Friday night. It looked like they would early on, as they controlled the first half, but a bad third quarter would doom them as the visiting Oyster River Bobcats took home a 47-45 win.
The Cardinals started the night on fire, led by a 14-point first half from Senior Jenna Pond. Oyster River could not stop Stevens’ transition offense, leading to many open layups. The first quarter ended with the Cardinals up 16-10.
Stevens continued to pull ahead to start the second, but missed layups and missed opportunities began to add up.
“We could not make easy layups,” said Cardinals head coach Ivy Condon. “If we make all of our layups, that is a different game. We probably missed 40 to 50.”
The Bobcats chipped away at the lead all second quarter, until a buzzer beater by sophomore Ella Stasko tied the contest at 24 heading into the break.
A difficult third quarter for the Cardinals boosted the visiting Oyster River girls to go out in front on the scoreboard. Stevens began to struggle on the offensive boards, as the Bobcats’ height became an advantage.
“We got out-rebounded,” said Condon of what caused the third quarter struggles. “We could not find a body to box out, and it killed us in the end.”
Along with the offensive rebounding, Oyster River took advantage of solid offensive outputs from freshman Natalie Simonds (13 points) and sophomore Carissa Miller (11 points) to pull ahead.
With seven seconds remaining in the third, Stevens junior Sydney Miller (game-high 17 points) took the ball up the court and drained a three pointer at the buzzer to give her team back the lead. However, an offensive foul by the Cardinals would dismiss the shot, and swing momentum fully in Oyster River’s favor. The Bobcats led 31-30 after the third.
The visitors outscored the Cardinals 11-6 for a majority of the fourth.
Stevens called a timeout down 42-37 with 2:41 left on the game clock.
Stevens came out of the timeout in a full court press defense and pumped energy back into the home crowd.
“I wanted to bring the pressure up,” said Condon. “Its about teaching where to play under pressure, we are not used to pressing. But it started clicking.”
The defensive strategy did click for the Cardinals, as they started forcing turnovers and getting easy layups to close the gap in the final minutes.
However, Oyster River would keep making their free throws and Stevens fell just short, 47-45.
The Cardinals (1-4) will be back in action January 2nd against rival Fall Mountain, while Oyster River (4-1) will host the Pelham Pythons January 4th.
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