Lady Warriors hold off Bellwood-Antis
By Philip Cmor
pcmor@altoonamirror.com
CLAYSBURG — Sydney Reffner and her Everett Area High School girls basketball teammates can rest well today.
They certainly earned it.
Pursuing the seemingly questionable approach of trying to engage Bellwood-Antis at its own rocket-paced style, the Lady Warriors proved up to the challenge. They beat the Lady Devils at their own breakneck game and shook B-A monkey off their back after losing in the Inter-County Conference championship game the last two years by pulling off a 62-58 upset for its first ICC title on Saturday night at Claysburg-Kimmel High School.
Reffner, who said she was looking forward to a good night’s sleep after 32 minutes of entertaining, up-and-down-the-court action, led Everett with 17 points. Forward Cammie Jenkins used her inside power to finish with 14, and Lady Warrior point guard Kristen Mills netted 12.
“We’ve played Bellwood a lot. They’re good competitors. They’re fun to compete against, and it was nice to get a good win against a good team,” Reffner said.
Everett led by 13 points at halftime, then seemed to run out of gas in the second half when Bellwood, behind the potent combination of Karson Swogger and Alli Campbell, whittled the margin to one.
The Lady Warriors, though, came back to life, going on a 17-6 run to push its advantage back to double-digits and render the Lady Devils final-minute surge for nought.
“It was heart and desire,” Reffner said. “We wanted it. We wanted it so bad. It was just out of our hearts, and we played to the best of our ability.”
Freshman guard Kaitlyn Maxwell was one of Everett’s heroes in clutch time, going 6-for-8 at the foul line during the clinching run.
“I was nervous,” Maxwell said with a giggle. “I just kept thinking with God all things are possible. I focused on honoring Him, and my teammates from the bench were telling me I could do it.”
The South Division champion, Everett improved to 18-5. Bellwood had beaten the Lady Warriors, 57-47, on Jan. 11.
“We watched the game film (on Friday night) as a team, and we talked about how many silly mistakes we made on the offensive end. Tonight, we drove and kicked and drove again, instead of just driving and turning it over,” Everett coach Keith Moyer said. “The kids executed the gameplan to perfection and, tonight, our guards were better than their guards.”
Which is saying something, considering Bellwood’s backcourt includes Swogger and Campbell. Swogger is the all-time leading scorer in Blair County history and a Saint Francis University recruit. Campbell already has two Division I college scholarship offers.
However after making three 3-pointers in a furious eight minutes that saw the teams combine for 40 points and ended with Everett holding a 23-17 lead, the Lady Devils finished just 3-for-15 from 3-point range in the first half. Bellwood-Antis made its run in the second half by getting away from shooting 3s and instead focusing on defense and transition offense.
The result was turnabout from last year, when Everett brought a 21-1 mark into the game and Bellwood was 18-4.
“For whatever reason, I just don’t think we were ready to play,” Bellwood coach Jim Swaney said. “Maybe we just weren’t as ready for them to come out as hard as what they did. All the credit goes to Everett. Except for the third quarter and a little bit of the fourth quarter, they dominated the game.”
A trey at the very end gave Swogger a game-high 25 points. Campbell added 18.
The game was tight through the first 6 minutes before Everett went on a 14-run to surge to a 29-17 lead. Swogger drove to the hoop and finished with her left hand to end the flurry, only for Reffner to convert a 3-pointer off Mills’ assist.
Jenkins, though, did most of the damage. With forward Sophie Damiano saddled with fouls, Bellwood had no real inside defender to handle the powerful, 5-foot-9 Jenkins, and she scored 11 in the first half, including six on the 14-0 run.
“I was feeling really good to start the game off. I was just hoping my teammates would see me underneath, because I had the girl posted up the whole time. They caught me on the roll, and I got scores and got fouled a bit,” Jenkins said.
Everett enters this week’s District 6 Class 3A playoffs as the sixth seed, but this win and an early-season victory over Bedford make the Lady Warriors look very dangerous.
“I think (this) solidifies the fact that we can compete with anybody,” Moyer said.
Bellwood is the third seed in a loaded District 6 Class 2A field, but Saturday’s loss might serve a good wake-up call for a team rarely challenged in the regular season.
“When you go through some adversity, you can go two ways. You can blame things on other people,” Swaney said “or you can let it forge you into something stronger. I think (the latter) is what we’re going to do.”
Game notes: Everett hosts Philipsburg-Osceola in the 3A first round on Tuesday. Bellwood won’t open 2A postseason action until Wednesday, when it hosts the winner of Penns Manor and Purchase Line. … Two junior high games opened Saturday’s quadrupleheader. Claysburg-Kimmel beat Southern Fulton in the girls game before McConnellsburg beat Williamsburg in the boys tilt.
EVERETT (62): Mills 4 2-4 12, Maxwell 1 6-8 8, Reffner 5 6-7 17, Prather 3 3-3 9, Jenkins 5 4-7 14, Hicks 1 0-0 2, Colledge 0 0-0 0. Totals — 19 21-29 62.
BELLWOOD-ANTIS (58): Swogger 8 6-9 25, D’Angelo 1 0-0 3, Campbell 7 3-5 18, Carles 2 0-0 5, Damiano 1 0-0 2, E. Leidig 1 0-0 3, Hollen 0 0-0 0, A. Leidig 0 0-0 0. Totals — 21 9-14 58.
SCORE BY QUARTERS
Everett 23 11 6 22 — 62
Bellwood-Antis 17 4 17 19 — 58
3-point goals: Everett 3 (Mills 2, Reffner); Bellwood-Antis 7 (Swogger 3, D’Angelo, E. Leidig, Campbell, Carles).
Records: Everett (18-5); Bellwood-Antis (20-3).
Officials: Rich Gergely, Clark Adelman, Jason Moschgat.
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