One thing you hear a lot after a loss is, “well, you’re not going to win very many games when you shoot like that.” It’s a way to justify a bad game, because bad games are painful.
But sometimes, you do win when you shoot that badly.
Let’s go to Bangor. Or, to be more precise, I went to Bangor for the B North Boys semifinals.
The Old Town boys shot 0/19 from three for the game. Zero for Nineteen. In fact, no one made a three until MDI’s Spencer Laurendeau hit one with under a minute to play. What Old Town did get was 20 rebounds from Emmitt Byther (to go with 11 points).
They’ll play Orono in the B North Regional Final.
Speaking of Orono, the defending champs came out swinging, including this play to end the first quarter.
I was court-side for that and oh man was it nice from 30 feet away.
For all the talk of B North being wide-open, Orono certainly came out and made a statement. They held Chance Mercier to 8 points and led the entire way, eventually pushing the lead to double digits in the second half before Ellsworth went with the unusual strategy of burning through their fouls to get to the bonus with over 4 minutes to go.
It didn’t work.
One thing that’s become apparent as this season goes by is that it’s harder to execute the strategy of fouling to get back into the game without the possibility of your opponent missing the front end of a one-and-one. Especially if there’s no shot clock to force them to give up the ball. Maybe someone will figure out some novel strategy that’ll work better.
After that, I headed south, but apparently I missed a good one.
Tyler’s got the video in there of Mikayla Emerson’s game winner against MDI. Old Town will face Ellsworth in the Regional Final.
I made it down to the Expo for the Boys A South Semis, which drew 2,050 fans for the session.
In the first game, Noble put together a 22-6 second quarter to take control of a tight game against Westbrook. Jamier Rose was everywhere for the Knights and we were on triple-double watch in the second half. He finished with 22/9a/8s/5r and, man, he’s fun to watch.
As for Noble, they earned their first-ever spot in a Regional Final.
What a great story.
Meanwhile, back in Augusta…
So in my podcast episode where I pick a Cinderella in each region, I picked Messo. They beat Hampden by 30-plus at the end of the regular season and a couple people there told me that they would have won even if Zach McLaughlin had been available. So I wasn’t surprised they won. I was surprised they held Evans Sterling to only seven points.
The final game of the night was Gray-New Gloucester and Freeport at the Portland Expo and it was electric.
Freeport kept up their hot shooting from the quarterfinals, going 11/23 from three. JT Pound was 4/6 from distance as part of his 18 points. But GNG matched them, going 10/21 from three.
But the real issue for GNG wasn’t Freeport’s shooting. It was foul trouble. Nate and Aidan Hebert each had three in the first half (Aidan would eventually foul out).
The teams matched big shot after big shot and Freeport had a chance to tie with under a minute to go, but it rimmed out and GNG made their free throws to advance.
The A South Regional Final is going to be a lot of fun.
