AUGUSTA — Dominique Lewis was not going to let the opportunity pass by again.

In a tie game with less than 30 seconds remaining, the 5-foot-4 guard had the ball in her hands a few feet behind the 3-point arc after passing on a potential go-ahead shot moments earlier. This time she did not hesitate.

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Lawrence players celebrate after a 46-42 win over Bangor in the Eastern Class A girls’ basketball championship game Saturday at the Augusta Civic Center. Joe Phelan/Kennebec Journal

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“Time was ticking and we needed points,” Lewis said, “so I just decided to let it go.”

It was a championship-winning decision.

Lewis’ 3-pointer with 19.4 seconds lifted second-seeded Lawrence to a 46-42 victory over No. 1 Bangor in the Eastern Class A girls’ basketball final Saturday afternoon at the Augusta Civic Center.

It’s the first regional title for Lawrence since 1994, when Cindy Blodgett led the Bulldogs to a fourth consecutive state championship.

Lewis, a junior, knocked down five 3-pointers on her way to a game-high 16 points.

“I was so proud of her,” Lawrence senior captain Paige Belanger said. “She’s a very, very good player and very good shooter. That whole last few minutes was a blur.”

Belanger won the Bob Why-tock Award as the tournament’s most outstanding player, largely for her play at the defensive end. Though she averaged less than seven points, she often drew the opposition’s best player.

Saturday, she had the primary responsibility of guarding Bangor star Mary Butler, a 6-foot-1 guard, and helped hold her to 10 points on 3-of-18 shooting. Belanger also had seven rebounds, five points and a pair of assists.

“She’s a very, very good player and I was up to the challenge,” Belanger said. “I wanted to guard her. “She’s very good shooting outside, she’s a good post-up (player and) she’s very good driving. She’s all around a very respectable player.”

Lawrence standout Nia Irving drew the bulk of the Rams’ attention. Irving, who averaged 30 points in the previous two tournament games, finished with 10 points and seven rebounds while constantly facing double teams in the post, yet she found other ways to be effective.

Irving was ever-present as a facilitator of the Bulldogs’ offense out of the high post and finished without a turnover. All three of her assists came on inside-out passes to Lewis for 3-pointers at the top of the key.

“She realized she was going to have a hard time getting the ball up inside and she made some nice passes,” Lawrence Coach John Donato said. “If Nia’s shut down, somebody else is going to pick up the load. This game right here, it was our outside shooting, which hasn’t been very good lately, but it was good today.”

Behind the play of Lewis, Irving and Belanger, and a couple 3-pointers from Morgan Boud-reau off the bench, Lawrence (20-1) looked to be in position to close out the Rams (19-2) without any drama, holding a 41-35 lead with 1:48 remaining.

But a 3-pointer by Katie Butler with 1:26 to go cut the deficit in half. Lawrence then went 1 of 4 at the free-throw line, and Bangor’s Cordelia Stewart made 1 of 2 from the line to keep the Rams within 42-39 heading into the final minute.

Sarah Bragg, who led the Rams with 14 points, tied it with a 3-pointer from the right wing with 34 seconds left.

The Bulldogs then patiently worked the ball around until Lewis got it at the top of the key.

“The way we were going to win this game was by our outside shooting,” Donato said. “They were packing it in on Nia. When you’re the player of the year three years in a row, she’s not going to get many shots, (but) our outside shooting won the game for us.”

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