By HUNTER O. LYLE
BRADFORD, PA – Fueled by Baylee Francis’ early offensive explosion, the Otto-Eldred girl’s basketball team secured their first-ever North Tier League Tournament Championship, beating Port Allegany 60-29.
Although O-E and Port finished the regular season as No. 1 and No. 2 in the league, the gap in between the two was more than evident. Dominating throughout their schedule, the Lady Terrors came away with a series sweep over the Lady Gators, winning 51-25 on Thursday, Dec. 4 and 47-38 on Tuesday, Jan 27.
“We know Otto-Eldred comes with that pressure, that 1-3-1. They’ve been playing it off-and-on for years but the last few weeks they’ve been reliant on it,” said Port Allegany head coach Jamie Evens. “They create good pressure, they’ve got good length and they do a good job of forcing us where we don’t want to be.”
Despite the disparity in matchup records, in the early goings Port looked primed to move the needle in their direction. Out of the gates, they opened the game by forcing an O-E turnover before converting it into three points from a long range jumper from Brynn Evens. Coming away with two more stops, including another steal, the Lady Gators took an early 5-0 lead from Jenna Renner’s drive to the hoop. However, from there, the tide quickly turned.
With their offense sputtering, the Lady Terrors turned to their defense, which quickly found a foothold. Pestering Port with a full-court-press and a fluid 1-3-1 zone defense in the half court, O-E immediately stunted the Lady Gators, creating four consecutive turnovers as Port’s offense ground to a halt. Then, their attack kicked off.
Starting with a fastbreak score from Rayel Hakes, the Lady Terrors caught fire, sparking a 13-2 run that firmly put them in front. Shouldering the majority of the offensive load was Francis, who attacked on all fronts. Crashing the offensive glass, scrapping for loose balls, tipping passes and converting open looks into points on the scoreboard, Francis tallied 13 early points as O-E jumped out to a 15-9 lead after the first eight minutes.
While Port’s offense continued to search for answers, their hopes rested on their shots from long range, but to no avail. As their jumpers continuously missed their mark, the Lady Gators’ cold streak continued, going without a basket for close to four minutes of play. Meanwhile, O-E only tighten their grip on the game.
Relentlessly maintaining possession by cleaning the glass and stripping passes, the Lady Terrors swiftly ran up the score. At the core was Francis, who, after a layup from Ayla Van Scoter on their first possession, tacked on 10 uninterrupted points for O-E.
As Francis and the Lady Terrors continued to surge – Francis ended with 21 first half points with four 3-pointers made – O-E’s lead swelled to 22 as they entered the break.
“She’s a great athlete and she really works at every sport she plays. It doesn’t matter what season it is. It’s amazing to say this is probably her second best sport, I’d say she’s probably a better softball player,” said Otto-Eldred head coach Shawn Gray. “She’s a spiritual leader on the team too. She roots for everybody and she’s one of the many that have the greenlight. If they’re not going to guard her, she’s going to shoot it and I really think she got us going in the right direction.”
Entering the second half, Port’s turnover trouble ensued. After giving up a combined 15 in the first 16 minutes of play, the Lady Gators surrendered the ball on both of their first possessions. Although they would be the first to enter the second half scorebooks off a second chance score from Renner, their offense again dried up soon after.
On the other side of the court, O-E was as comfortable as ever. Still controlling the boards, the pace and the momentum, the Lady Terrors began rotating in reserves who carried the torch seamlessly. Patiently running their halfcourt sets as they looked to iron out any ruffles in their offense, O-E outscored Port 12-4 throughout the third, all but sealing the title as they built a 46-18 advantage.
“I actually told the kids on the bench how proud it made me that I could trust them to go in and keep the defensive intensity where it was. We always focus on rebounding and we don’t have a lot of height when we start putting in reserves but I thought they battled on the glass,” said Gray. “It says a lot about those kids because they don’t get to play a whole lot in varsity games but they were ready to go and all the accolades go to them.”
After a few more minutes with their foot on the gas, the Lady Terrors finally relented. Substituting their all-bench lineup, O-E cruised to the finish line, winning their first-ever North Tier League Championship.
“It’s great. It’s one of the things we’ve been talking about the past few weeks. It wasn’t really on our ‘to-do’ list, so to say, but I told them that it’s been around three years and we haven’t won it yet,” said Gray. “It’d be something new to put on their resume.”
Along with her 24 points, Francis also came away with five rebounds while Van Scoter finished with 14 points and Jahden Smith ended with six points, five rebounds, three assists and seven steals. Port was led by Renner with eight points in the loss.
Regardless of the outcome, both teams now eye the upcoming District 9 postseason. For O-E, who hold the second seed in Class A, they will return home on Friday for a third meeting with No. 7 Austin. Port, on the other hand, will be on the road, taking to Kane for their semifinal matchup in the Class 2A bracket on Wednesday, Feb. 25.
“We have ten days to figure (Kane) out so I haven’t looked a whole lot at them. Obviously, we played them earlier in the year so we know (Addison) Haight will be a problem,” said Evens of Kane’s sophomore, who has already reached 1,000 career points. “Beyond that, we haven’t done much gameplanning. We’re just working on our fundamentals and trying to get ourselves better.”
AT BRADFORD
Port Allegany (29)
Renner 4 0-1 8, Fillhart 1 3-6 5, Evens 2 0-1 5, Mahon 1 2-2 4, Darush 0 3-4 3, Gordon 1 0-0 2, Bell 1 0-0 2. Totals: 10 8-14 29
Otto-Eldred (60)
Francis 8 3-3 24, Van Scoter 6 0-0 14, Smith 3 0-0 6, Hakes 2 0-0 5, Johnson 2 0-0 5, Prescott 1 0-0 3, Edminster 1 0-0 2, Prince 0 1-2 1. Totals: 23 4-5 60
Port Allegany 9 13 18 29
Otto-Eldred 15 35 46 60
Three-point goals: PA (1) Evens, O-E (10) Francis 5, Van Scoter 2, Hakes, Johnson; Total fouls: PA 4, O-E 15; Fouled out: None.
