PORTLAND — When you play a team as talented as McAuley High, the top seed in the Western Class A girls’ basketball tournament, you have a choice: try to take away their inside or outside game.
Eighth-ranked Westbrook opted to try to take away the inside. Problem was, the Lions — especially Allie Clement — didn’t miss much from outside.
Additional Photos
McAuley rolled past the Blazes 41-23 in a quarterfinal at the Portland Expo. Clement had 17 points, including two 3-pointers in the final 45 seconds of the second quarter that gave McAuley control for good.
“Allie was being Allie,” said Lions Coach Bill Goodman, whose team is 19-0. “She’s a great player. She struggled at times this year. She just forgets all that stuff. She’s got a great attitude for the game. She doesn’t get too high or too low.
“She shot great tonight. She was good.”
McAuley will play No. 5 Windham — a team the Lions beat 41-32 on Jan. 3 — in the regional semifinals at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Cumberland County Civic Center. Westbrook, which lost by 30 to McAuley in the regular season, finished 9-11.
The Blazes came out in a delay tactic, hoping to limit McAuley’s chances. That didn’t surprise the Lions, who practiced all week against it. But the Lions still struggled to get any offensive rhythm — until Clement got hot.
“I’ve been working on that for a while, getting my shot down,” said Clement. “Just focusing on what I needed to do to fix my shot. It’s been a little off. I think it finally came together. People were giving me good passes and it was going in.”
After going scoreless in the first quarter, she had 10 in the second, including the two big 3s. Westbrook trailed 15-6 when she hit the first from the right wing. Then, after the Lions forced a turnover, she hit another from the top of the key off the dribble with 1.9 seconds left for a 21-6 halftime lead.
That, said Westbrook Coach Chris Aube, was huge.
“We had the pace where we wanted,” he said. “Those 3s took it from nine to 15 and we kind of had to play a little different type of basketball.”
Westbrook got within 10 midway through the third, forcing Goodman to call a timeout. The Lions came out and got inside baskets from Victoria Lux and Oliva Smith, and then, after a Kayla Winton 3, Clement and Sadie DiPierro hit back-to-back 3s to make it 31-14.
“We just needed to stop turning the ball over and be patient,” said Clement. “We also needed to get back on defense to stop their penetration and start rebounding and boxing out. Once we kind of got up-speed and got our tempo back, then the easy baskets came that way.”
Staff Writer Mike Lowe can be contacted at 791-6422 or at:
mlowe@pressherald.com
Twitter: MikeLowePPH
Send questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.