LISBON — Monmouth Academy pulled away from the Lisbon Greyhounds in the second half to seal a 43-30 win in a girls Mountain Valley Conference basketball matchup on Wednesday.
Pressure from the Mustangs frustrated the Greyhounds, who opened the game shooting 2-for-8 from the field. Lisbon Coach Julie Petrie thought her team’s offense was a little tentative to open the game against the two-time defending State Class C champions.
“I thought defensively we did well,” said Petrie. We were just very passive on offense. We just really didn’t get an offensive flow going to start.”
“I have a bunch of role players that are learning to step into leading roles,” said first-year Monmouth coach Rick Larrabee. “As we play any team it doesn’t matter from the top of the league to the bottom, we’re going to get everybody’s best game.”
The Mustangs opened the scoring off the opening tip as Abby Ferland drove the hoop for a score. After a pair of Lisbon turnovers, Audrey Fletcher’s jumper added to the Monmouth lead and forced an early timeout from the Greyhounds.
Ferland picked off a pass and went in alone for a layup out of the timeout, but the Greyhounds answered with their first field goal as Carly Drischler drained a trey from the corner.
Both teams struggled to find points late in the opening quarter. Despite the cold start, Lisbon trailed just 8-5 after one.
Monmouth was unable to get separation from the Greyhounds until midway through the second quarter. After Lisbon’s Mallory Fairbanks cut the lead to 12-9, Kaeti Butterfield immediately answered for the Mustangs with a 3-pointer. Butterfield then added two from the post on the Mustangs’ next possession, and the quick 5-0 run forced Lisbon to take a timeout with the score at 17-9.
Lisbon’s Destiney Deschaines was left alone underneath for an easy two just before the half to keep the Greyhounds within striking distance, 19-12.
“I had a plan going into the game where we had to wait for certain moments in the game to do certain things and we executed that,” said Larrabee. “I had to wait for the second half to wait for the pressure that you saw. It’s a big court.”
Fairbanks opened the scoring for Lisbon in the second half, picking off a pass at midcourt and driving in alone for two. Butterfield responded for the Mustangs, once again working down low to get a layup. Lisbon refused to go away as Charlee Cox and Fairbanks added buckets.
Monmouth led the Greyhounds 26-18 with 2:24 remaining in the third quarter.
“We talked about that, I just felt like we were dribbling too much and not really getting good shot opportunities,” said Petrie. “The third quarters kind of been our Achilles Heel, so we tried to make that our quarter today, which we did.”
The Greyhounds (0-4) found themselves in foul trouble early in the third quarter, leading to some free points for Monmouth. The Mustangs added seven points overall in the third quarter from the free-throw line, shooting 7-of-9 from the line. Both teams found themselves in the bonus in the third quarter in what Larrabee called a physical game.
“That stuff needs to be called, they need to control the game,” said Larrabee of the officials. “Both teams shouldn’t be shooting 10 foul shots 30 seconds into the fourth quarter. It was physical both ways, both teams had to deal with adversity.”
Butterfield gave Monmouth a 33-19 lead heading into the final quarter with a steal and score just before the buzzer.
“Do I like laying games like this, because of the physicality and the officiating and stuff like that? No I don’t. But, on the opposite end of that it builds character, it builds knowledge of the game and players learn how to play.”
In a fourth quarter largely dominated by both teams heading to the foul line, Monmouth was able to continue its hot shooting. The Mustangs built the lead to 39-22 as Julia Johnson was perfect from the line.
Lisbon kept battling as Kiley Merritt knocked down a trey. Merritt then found Cox cutting to the basket for two.
The late rally fell short as Monmouth held on for the 43-30 win.
The Mustangs improved to 2-3 and were led by Butterfield with 13 points, while Katie Harris added eight points for Monmouth.
Fairbanks led Lisbon, who fell to 0-4, with eight points and Merritt chipped in six.
“Obviously you want to win and we’re still working for that first one,” said Petrie, whose squad visits Dirigo on Friday at 6:30 p.m. “But, if they keep working we’re going to get them, they’ll come.”
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