Lewisburg holds off tired Penns Valley girls’ basketball

The Penns Valley defense was getting the stops, and there were plenty of opportunities to make a comeback.

The Lady Rams simply didn’t have the legs Saturday night on the basketball court.

“We were just tired,” Jordan Andrus said after Penns Valley fell 51-41 to Lewisburg, completing a stretch of three games in four days. The tight slate was capped facing the state’s No. 9 team in Class 4A.

“My legs are a little sore,” Andrus added.

The fatigue showed in a 28 percent shooting effort and an inability to sustain any momentum or get scores while shutting down the Green Dragons.

“We just didn’t hit our shots tonight,” coach Karen McCaffrey said. “We had some open looks and some nice drives to the hoop, but we just didn’t finish.”

Andrus paced Penns Valley (10-3) with 12 points along with six rebounds, while Hannah Montminy added 11 points and four assists. Peyton Homan posted eight points and seven rebounds off the bench.

The Lady Rams’ stretch of games to close the week included a loss at Tyrone on Wednesday and a decisive win at Bald Eagle Area on Friday, but McCaffrey played her starters more than she would have liked at BEA because they needed the work and confidence. There wasn’t much left in their collective tanks by the second half Saturday.

“When you play a game of that caliber, you’d like to come in fresh,” McCaffrey said. “We’d like a chance to prepare. But my kids didn’t give up and we didn’t stop fighting.”

The Lady Rams forced 17 turnovers with their pressure defense, including eight steals, but didn’t have much to show for it at the other end.

Trailing by eight to start the final quarter, Penns Valley had its best run with a put-back bucket and later two free throws for Homan. In all the defense held Lewisburg to just two points over a stretch of 5:28 from the third into the fourth.

But, otherwise, there was one shot bouncing off the rim after another.

“We were fighting hard enough and we were closing the gap,” Andrus said. “I thought if we kept fighting as hard as we were, we’d be able to get more points (than) they’d get. But we had a tough time making our shots.”

Lewisburg coach Phil Stamm knew his girls just needed to hang on with their defense.

“We just needed to keep our composure,” Stamm said. “They were really aggressive defensively. We just wanted to make sure we were running our sets and we thought we could take advantage of their aggressiveness, and a couple times we did.”

Grace Kelleher’s 21 points led Lewisburg (10-1), with nine each for Jamie Fedorjaka and Bethany Rippin.

The Green Dragons finally found some open shots late. Kelleher kept driving the lane and drawing fouls to go 6 for 10 from the line in the final five minutes and the Lady Rams were left to regroup, though they also saw some silver linings.

“We never gave up,” Andrus said. “We’ve had a couple rough games recently. In this game we finally got back into it. Even if we didn’t win, I still think we played well (Saturday).”

The Lady Rams may have lost two of their last three, but they are getting good tests with the postseason only a few weeks away.

“These are the games that we want to be in,” McCaffrey said. “These are the games that are going to make us better. We need to get some momentum now.”

This story was originally published January 20, 2018 at 11:35 PM with the headline "Lewisburg holds off tired Penns Valley girls’ basketball."