Pioneer Girls Rally Past James Wood, 72-64

Posted: January 13, 2016
By MARK SAWYER
Special to The Winchester Star

WINCHESTER — Last season three games between the Millbrook and James Wood girls’ basketball teams were decided by a total of 12 points, and that’s only because the last one was a seven-point margin.

Expecting nothing less than a hard-fought, nip-and-tuck battle down to the final horn, the two teams got together for the first time this season Tuesday night and the fans weren’t disappointed — especially down the stretch.

After letting a 14-point lead in the first half slip away, the Pioneers rallied from a three-point fourth quarter deficit by outscoring the Colonels 19-8 over the final six minutes of the contest for a 72-64 Conference 21A victory over their Frederick County and Northwestern District rival at James W. Casey Gymnasium.

“It’s always that type of game every time we play them. We knew coming in it was going to be a battle right down to the end,” Millbrook coach Kevin Barr said. “This was our first conference game so it was a huge win. It was a good win but we still have things we need to get better at.”

Trailing 50-47 to start the fourth quarter, James Wood (7-3, 1-2 conference, 1-1 Northwestern District) came out on fire.

Senior Grace Greene pulled the Colonels to within one on a layup to start the quarter. After Millbrook sophomore Maddie Green hit a jumper to put the Pioneers back up by three, Wood junior Amanda Christian had the hot hand.

With 7:10 left in the game, Christian buried the last of her three 3-pointers to tie the game at 52-52. On the next trip down the floor, she hit a short jumper to give the Colonels their first lead since the first quarter 54-52.

Just over a minute later, Keiana Brooks hit a pair of free throws to push the Wood lead to 56-53 with 5:49 remaining.

At that point, Barr called a timeout to help his team regroup and it worked to perfection.

Millbrook (9-5, 1-0 conference, 3-0 district) came out of the timeout and Green immediately drilled a 3-pointer to tie it at 56, and not even a minute later, senior Lauren Reed picked up a loose ball and raced for an easy layup, giving the Pioneers the lead back for good, 59-58.

Consecutive buckets by Amari Anthony and Erika Reed extended the Millbrook lead to 63-58 with 3:23 left.

But Brooks refused to quit and showed just how determined she was to collect her first career victory over the Pioneers.

With time winding down, Brooks continued to drive the lane, making one handed scoop shots to keep her team in the contest. She scored four straight to pull the Colonels back to within three at 63-60 with 2:27 left.

Following a Wood timeout, Erika Reed seemingly took the final wind out of the sail for the Colonels by knocking down a huge 3-pointer with 1:19 to play to push the lead back to 68-62.

Brooks added two more of her game-high 23 points down the stretch, but the Pioneers closed the game on a 4-0 run for the final margin.

“It’s really important to win those types of games, especially since it’s our first conference game against a good team,” Lauren Reed said. “We knew we needed to pick it up and needed to focus. We didn’t want to continue to let them have the momentum. We just needed to keep it together and continue to play good solid basketball.

“It’s definitely big when you have five players on the floor at once that can all score. It takes the pressure off of us. We want to use this win going forward. We have Skyline on Thursday.”

Early in the contest it was back and forth.

Wood scored the first six points of the game for its biggest lead of the night only to see the Pioneers score 10 of the next 13 for their first lead, 10-9.

Wood answered with a 5-0 run for a 14-10 advantage, and Millbrook finished the quarter with a 9-2 run to take a 19-16 lead after one.

Leading 22-21 midway through the second, Barr called his first timeout of the game and his club responded in a big way.

The Pioneers came out of the timeout and ripped off a 15-2 run to grab the biggest lead of the night for either team, 37-23, with under a minute left in the half.

Wood recovered a bit and trimmed the deficit to 38-27 at the break.

The Colonels returned from the locker room on a mission and went right to work on that double-digit deficit.

Greene started the second half with a layup and the next trip down the floor Brooks was fouled on the way to the hoop.

Her free throw cut the lead to 38-32 and she pulled her team to within four on a fast break layup after gathering a loose ball and going coast to coast.

Three free throws by Lauren Reed pushed the lead back to seven (41-34) but back-to-back buckets by Brooks cut the deficit to three and the Colonels evened the score when Christian buried her first three of the night with 4:20 left in the third.

“I think we played an amazing game on both ends of the court,” James Wood coach Krista Crites said. “I am not upset at all. They did everything they were supposed to do, their defense was great, their offense was great against a very good team. To only lose by eight, we were in it.

“They got us at the foul line. They made seven more than we shot. The foul line game was pretty critical and they made some shots there at the end of the game that sealed it for them. But I am excited for my kids, I thought they did great.”

Lauren Reed led four Pioneers in double figures with 20 points. Green added 18, Erika Reed and Anthony chipped in 15 and 11, respectively.

In addition to Brooks, Greene finished with 12, and Christian and Amber Wooldridge added 11 points apiece.