The Langford Area girls basketball team won a pair of nail-biters in three outings this past week to wrap up its pre-Christmas schedule with a 3-1 record.
The Lady Lions trailed by a point after three periods but won a 48-47 decision over Estelline-Hendricks last week Tuesday, fell to an unbeaten Ipswich squad 57-27 on Friday, and bounced back with a 58-53 overtime victory over Hitchcock-Tulare on Saturday.
Coach Michael Alberts’ club is back in action on Tuesday against Lead-Deadwood in the NSU Classic in Aberdeen at 10 a.m.
“We learned a lot about ourselves this week,” said Alberts. “We still need to keep getting better, but very proud of our girls and where we are at heading into Christmas break.”
Langford Area 48
Estelline-Hendricks 47
Langford Area trailed at the first three quarter breaks but outscored Estelline-Hendricks 13-11 in the final period for the one-point win.
The visitors held a two-point edge after one period and led by just one at intermission and following three quarters in the tightly-contested game. Josie Jensen led LA scorers with 17 points and pulled down a whopping 19 rebounds. Clarissa Guy added 13 points and also grabbed 13 rebounds. Alex Darling was credited with four assists.
“We didn’t shoot very well from behind the 3-point line, going 0-15,” noted Alberts. “We took good shots, they just weren’t falling for us. Our post players really stepped up and had big games for us. We really crashed the boards on both ends and got a lot of second chance opportunities.”
Ipswich 57
Langford Area 27
Ipswich jumped out to a 19-7 first quarter lead and pulled away at each quarter break.
“Ipswich is a very good team and really made it hard for us to really get anything going offensively,” Alberts said. “They are also a tough team to defend because they have a lot of girls that can score. After this game, we talked about how we really wanted to bounce back after things not going well in this game and play well the next day.”
Paytyn Marlow had three treys and scored 12 points to lead LA
Langford Area 58 (OT)
Hitchcock-Tulare 53
Langford Area saw a nine-point halftime lead disappear in the fourth quarter but jumped out to a five-point lead in overtime and held on for the win.
“I was very proud of our girls and how they responded after the Ipswich game,” stressed Alberts. “Hitchcock-Tulare has some taller girls which made it hard for us to get things going on the inside, but we were able to knock down shots from the outside and get to the free throw line. Hitchcock-Tulare fought back in the game and we lost our two main post players, but other girls stepped up and got enough stops when it mattered most. This was a tough and gritty win by our girls.”
The guard tandem of Paytyn Marlow and Alex Darling provided the outside scoring punch. Darling connected on five treys and Marlow added three more and the duo combined for 20 points in the opening half to help the Lady Lions to a 26-17 advantage at intermission.
Hitchcock-Tulare rallied with a 20-point third period to cut the margin to 39-37 but LA responded with an 8-2 run, led by Darling’s five counters, to go back up 47-39. The Patriots rallied again to tie the game at 48-all with 1:45 remaining, and each team managed just a free toss in the rest of regulation to force the extra period.
Darling opened the overtime period with her fifth three-pointer and Mariah Tosse added a bucket for a five-point LA advantage. H-T cut it back to three but Lizzie Gustafson answered with a fielder. The visitors cut it to three one final time but Marlow put the game on ice with a pair of free tosses with just three seconds remaining.
Marlow led the Lady Lions with 23 points, eight rebounds, and five assists, and Darling pumped in 21. Gustafson grabbed nine rebounds and Brooklynn West had six.
FOR FULL STATS, SEE THIS WEEK'S JOURNAL
