Mirror photo by Michael Boytim From left: Williamsburg's LeeAnna Royer, Levada Gorsuch and Raina Alexander surround Otto-Eldred's Addie Bell.

CLARION — Some say you haven’t truly lived until you have walked a mile in someone else’s shoes.

Williamsburg junior LeeAnna Royer played an entire PIAA second-round playoff basketball game that way Wednesday night at Clarion University.

The Lady Blue Pirates arrived at Tippin Gymnasium at 6:34 p.m. — when their game against District 9 runner-up Otto-Eldred was originally scheduled for 6 p.m. due to a car accident that closed part of Interstate 80 near Brookville.

After spending more than four hours on the bus, Royer realized the slippers she had on her feet were the only shoes she had.

“I was on the bus, and I was asking my sister if she put my white jersey in my bag,” Royer said. “And then I was like — ‘oh my gosh, I don’t even have my shoes.'”

Thankfully for Royer, Williamsburg was playing in the first game of a doubleheader that later featured Clearfield’s girls basketball team playing Blackhawk. Royer is friends with one of Clearfield’s players — Mia Helsel.

“She plays in the same AAU organization as me,” Royer said. “They told us they were coming early to watch our game. So, she told me I could use her shoes. I can fit into a 7, 8 or 9-size shoe.”

The shoes fit well enough for Royer and the Lady Pirates to survive in a sloppy 47-36 victory over Otto-Eldred that pushed Williamsburg into the PIAA quarterfinals for the fourth consecutive year.

The Lady Blue Pirates will play Bishop Carroll Catholic on Saturday, and Bishop Guilfoyle Academy and Saint Joseph’s will play each other in the other quarterfinal on the lower half of the bracket — guaranteeing a District 6 team will play for the PIAA Class 1A championship on Friday, March 28, at the Giant Center in Hershey.

“Going into districts, Bishop Carroll was the third seed, and we the fourth seed,” Williamsburg coach Angela Detwiler said. “It was really close where we could have ended up (as the No. 4 and No. 5 seed) if a game went differently with Blacklick Valley. I remember thinking what a tough first round game that would be, and now we’re meeting in the (PIAA quarterfinals), where if that would have been the first round matchup, one of us wouldn’t have made the state playoffs. That just goes to show how competitive District 6 is.”

Fortunately for Williamsburg, it wasn’t playing a District 6 school on Wednesday.

“I was sleeping the whole time here,” Royer said. “Four and a half hours on the bus — I feel like it kind of made us play a little differently than if we wouldn’t have been sitting on a bus for hours.”

Otto-Eldred actually took the lead late in the first quarter on a Carrie Drummond 3-pointer before the Terrors settled for a 13-13 score through eight minutes.

As she did in the first round of the PIAA playoffs, Williamsburg’s Levada Gorsuch picked up two first-quarter fouls and sat out much of the period.

“We were supposed to be trying to take the ball to the hoop then,” Otto-Eldred coach Shawn Gray said. “It just didn’t happen. They get up in your grill so much that they prevented us from getting the ball entered a lot of times. When we did, it seemed like the next pass was a turnover. We did see on film that (Gorsuch) is prone to fouls, so we talked about that and going aggressively into her. We had a chance and a window there, but we have had our offensive struggles — and we hit a lull there.”

Gorsuch returned in the second quarter and didn’t pick up her third foul until the third, allowing her to stay in the game and finish with a game-high 17 points.

“I need to play smarter,” Gorsuch said. “I need to come out and have zero or one foul in the first half, and then I can play my game the rest of the way. I need to be smarter, so I can be there for my team.”

Gorsuch and Anastasia Ranalli helped Williamsburg control the paint as Ranalli finished with a double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds.

“We focused on (Royer) and (Gorsuch) and tried to keep the ball out of (Royer’s) hands,” Gray said. “But I even told them before the game that (Ranalli) is the glue of that team. She does all the little things that you don’t notice defensively and rebounding and with her jump shot. She absolutely killed us tonight.”

Otto-Eldred trailed by only seven through three quarters after Rayel Hayes’ 3-pointer, but Williamsburg scored the first seven points of the fourth quarter on a Gorsuch layup, three Gorsuch free throws and a Royer jumper to make it 46-32 and seal the game.

“I feel like to start the game, it seemed like we were still on the bus,” Detwiler said. “We didn’t seem loose. We weren’t really meshing too well. We just didn’t look like normal. I’m glad we were able to get the win. But hopefully we got this out of our system. We just seemed out of sync tonight.”

Williamsburg left the school at 2:20 p.m. and tried to avoid the traffic by changing its route to the game.

“We knew there was a traffic issue, and we were in Philipsburg,” Williamsburg athletic director Jeff Detwiler said. “Instead of taking I-80, we got on 322 to avoid the accident on 80. But it seemed like all the trucks that must have been on 80 rerouted to 322 as well. Basically, it was a stop and go until we got to Brookville. From there, we got back on 80, and it was a long trip from 2:20 until 6:30.”

Around 6:20 p.m. it was announced Williamsburg had arrived and the game would start in 45 minutes — until it was corrected that it was actually one of Clarion’s teams coming in to practice and the Lady Blue Pirates were still on the road.

“The players were fine,” Jeff Detwiler said. “I called ahead to the game manager, and he couldn’t have been more understanding. I have a lot of respect for him, because he understood there was an accident, and he told us we’d have enough time to warm up.”

And thankfully, Helsel remembered her shoes.

OTTO-ELDRED (36): Bell 1 0-1 2, Drummond 2 2-2 8, Hayes 2 3-6 8, Van Scoter 3 0-0 6, Francis 3 1-2 7, Smith 0 0-0 0, Prince 1 0-0 2, Irons 1 0-0 3, Kinney 0 0-0 0, Edminster 0 0-0 0. Totals — 13 6-11 36.

WILLIAMSBURG (47): Ranalli 4 2-2 10, Prough 1 0-0 2, Royer 3 3-3 10, G. Colbert 2 0-0 5, Gorsuch 7 3-4 17, Alexander 1 1-2 3, Kagarise 0 0-0 0, Flaig 0 0-0 0, Rispoli 0 0-0 0. Totals — 18 9-11 47.

SCORE BY QUARTERS

Otto-Eldred 13 7 12 4 — 36

Williamsburg 13 16 10 8 — 47

3-point goals: Otto-Eldred 4 (Drummond 2, Hayes, Irons); Williamsburg 2 (Royer, G. Colbert).

Records: Otto-Eldred (23-6); Williamsburg (22-6).

Officials: LeahAnn Williams, Gabe Mild, Ty Barzak.