THE BEST FOR LAST
BLOOMSBURG — Southern Columbia saved its best basketball for the fourth quarter, turning a one-point lead into a 46-34 win over previously unbeaten Bloomsburg in girls basketball action Monday evening.
With the Panthers keeping pace, even closing out the third on a 4-1 run, the Tigers had their best one-quarter spread (14-3) to diminish any hope of a comeback win.
“We did have a little bit of a letdown in the third quarter,” Southern Columbia coach Kam Traugh said. “It was a battle so I think, obviously, we were tired and you could tell they were tired, but it was nice to see them come out in the fourth quarter with a spark and we just had some very nice successful plays on offense and was able to force some turnovers on defense and get some of those rebounds we weren’t getting earlier in the game.”
Ava Novak led the late charge for Southern (12-1), accounting for five of its first eight points in the frame. The rally led Bloomsburg (11-1) coach John Wittman to call a timeout, but it did little to slow the Tigers. Instead, Alli Griscavage took over and scored six of her game-high 18 points to help seal the deal.
Southern ate away at the clock with a lot of passing before dropping some mid-range shots. It led to Bloomsburg rushing things and getting away from what worked.
“They went into the stall offense and we were chasing that and when we came down, we were forcing on the inside offensively,” Wittman said. “We had a few turnovers and got fatigued.”
Seeing the Tigers’ bigs, Griscavage and Summer Tillett, finish strong was a promising sign for Traugh, who noted the team had recent struggles putting away teams.
“We told them that if they don’t rebound and we don’t have a good night underneath, it’s not going to be a good outcome for us,” Traugh said. “... I thought Alli played very smart in the fourth quarter because she was in foul trouble [three fouls] — so was Summer [four], but I had to pull Summer out. It’s hard because our girls usually don’t see a girl the same size as Maddie [Evans], and we knew Maddie was one of the best bigs in the area for sure. We knew it would be a challenge for our girls to just play smart and not be overly aggressive with her. ... This is one of the taller teams we probably seen so far this season.”
Griscavage had no trouble dominating the boards on either side early, scoring 11 first-half points. Evans, though, settled into her role and slowed Griscavage’s roll. Evans also accounted for 11 points.
She wasn’t alone in the Panthers’ second-half charge.
Bryn Zentner was aggressive throughout, coming away with a number of steals and rebounds. She made life twice as nice for Bloomsburg by helping the offense with a team-high 12 points.
“We challenged her at the half to step up and take charge,” Wittman said. “In the second quarter, she took a shot, missed it, got her own offensive board and put it back up. We explained that’s what we wanted from her the whole second half and she responded well.”
Despite Zentner’s and Evans’ great efforts, the Panthers just couldn’t close a deficit that was created by a 6-0 run early in the first quarter — a stretch Bloomsburg couldn’t get anything, not even free throws to fall.
“We weren’t surprised that it was a tight game and we were down because that’s a very good basketball team,” Bloomsburg coach John Wittman said. “We had to come out and fight in the second half and get control of the game. I thought we did, both offensively and defensively, getting the game down to one point. ... We just couldn’t get any closer than that.”
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