Torrid Wildcat rush beats Indians 63-43

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In his 30 years of coaching, Dick Barstow had never seen anything like it.

His Presque Isle Wildcats schoolgirl basketball team went on a fourth quarter tear that, arguably, could be called the most torrid stretch run in the 15-year history of the girls’ tournament.

When the dust finally settled, the Wildcats had scored 30 fourth-quarter points on 11-for-14 shooting (79 percent) from the floor to turn a hotly contested Eastern Maine Class A semifinal game against the Old Town Indians into a 63-43 blowout at the Bangor Auditorium Thursday night.

The third-seeded Wildcats, 15-5, will take on top-seeded Cony of Augusta Saturday at 7:05 p.m. Saturday, for the EM Class A championship. Cony defeated Skowhegan later Thursday night 87-63. Old Town, the second seed, finishes its season 13-7.

The win not only gave Barstow yet another EM final appearance to add to his already long-and-impressive coaching resume, but it also gave him his 500th career coaching victory.

It was the way the win came that pleased Barstow.

“I’ve never had a team play that well, that hard, and come through in the fourth quarter like they did,” Barstow said. “We have confidence in our defense and we play hard defensively. I think that was the key. We caused some turnovers, got the momentum, and that was it.”

Old Town Coach Garry Spencer was stunned by the sudden turn of events in the final eight minutes.

“It’s hard to sit through something like that,” Spencer said. “They got the lead to eight and I called a timeout. They got it up to 13 and I called another timeout. Before I knew it, it was up to 18. Then I decided we’d just have to go with it.”

Call it the Eastern Maine schoolgirl version of the Los Angeles Lakers.

The entire run – which was 34-13 in favor of the Wildcats – actually started with 54 seconds left in the third quarter when Kerry Eaton’s two free throws gave PI a 31-30 lead. The lead change was also the 16th and final lead change of the see-saw affair.

Presque Isle opened the final quarter with a 33-30 advantage and immediately started the run when Eaton, PI’s 6-foot-1 senior center, posted up for a hoop 18 seconds into the quarter.

Less than 30 seconds later, Nikki Fulton canned a baseline three-pointer to up the lead to 38-30 causing Spencer to call his first timeout.

The Indians promptly turned the ball over and two free throws by Stacy Hafford and a 10-foot jumper by Jennifer Hersey lifted the Wildcats lead to 42-30.

After Old Town’s Michelle Corro sank two free throws Kristen Davis (14 points, 7-for-10 shooting) then netted six unanswered points to make the score 48-32 with 4:17 still left in the game. For all intents and purposes, however, the game was already won.

Hafford netted eight more points down the stretch to keep the run alive and, behind some nifty transition play, the ‘Cats kept plenty of distance between themselves and their opponents.

Eaton was both dominating and intimidating inside for the Wildcats. In addition to her game-high 16 points, she also hauled in 17 rebounds in helping the Wildcats to a lopsided 41-24 advantage on the boards. She also changed many shots on the defensive end.

Hafford added 11 points and 9 assists for the winners while Jennifer Hersey added 10 points and 9 rebounds.

Old Town got 15 points from Corro and 9 more from Denise Treadwell, who also had a team-high 6 rebounds. Heather Brewer added 7 points and dished out 5 assists.

The Wildcats had jumped out to a 13-6 lead in the first quarter until Denise Treadwell hit a 21-foot three pointer with two seconds left.

Presque Isle Old Town

Sponberg 1 0 0 0 0 Ackley

0 0 0 0 0

Graves 0 0 0 0 0 Cote

6 1 2 0 3

Fulton 8 3 0 0 7 White

0 0 0 0 0

Holloway 1 1 0 0 3 Bernier

5 2 0 0 4

Staples 0 0 0 0 0 Emerson

1 0 0 0 0

Hafford 6 3 7 5 11 Brewer

5 2 4 3 7

Davis 10 7 0 0 14 Corro

16 6 2 2 15

Hersey 12 4 2 2 10 Fadrigon

1 0 1 0 0

Beaulieu 0 0 0 0 0 Yanush

0 0 4 1 1

Nightingale 1 0 0 0 0 Treadwell

14 4 0 0 9

Logan 1 1 0 0 2 Case

5 1 0 0 2

Eaton 14 7 4 2 16 McCannell

0 0 0 0 0

Smith 3

1 1 0 2

Totals 54 26 13 9 63 Totals 56 17 14

6 43

Presque Isle 13 19 33 63

Old Town 9 18 30 43

3-pt. goals: Presque Isle 2-8 – Fulton 1-4, Holloway 1-1, Hafford 0-1, Davis 0-1, Hersey 0-1; Old Town 3-11 – Cote 1-5, Brewer 0-1, Corro 1-4, Treadwell 1-1