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WESTLAKE, OH – The Rocky River Pirates once again showed massive amounts of resilience, heart and hustle to pull off a thrilling overtime victory, 62-56 at Westlake today. The game saw countless lead changes, and both team come back from second half deficits in this thrilling afternoon GLC matinee. The Demons have nothing to hang their heads about either, as they looked impressive once again and showed they can hang with anyone in the GLC.
For Westlake, they used an incredible two man game with Eleanor Henton who finished with 18 and Jacai Onunwor who tallied 20. The Pirates were led by senior Ava Patti with 26, and 8 coming in the overtime. Olivia Dewey had a nice game going until leaving the game with injury, she had 8 at that point. Another freshman having a big game was Liz Lang who tallied 9 while Mackenzie Russell had 6, with 3 of those coming in overtime.
After falling behind on a Eleanor Henton three ball to start the game, the Pirates came roaring back with 5 straight from Ava Patti. From there, Liz Lang nailed two free throws, and just like that it was 7-3 Pirates. The Demons bounced right back with an inside hoop from Taylor Kress then a three ball from Henton, as we were off to the races from there! It was a back and forth, nip and tuck quarter that ended with the Pirates clinging to a 14-12 lead, as Liz Lang hit a bucket right before the end of the quarter.
After a Lang foul shot increased the lead to 15-12 to start the second quarter, Henton came back again for the Demons with a big shot, nailing a three from the elbow to even it up at 15 in the early moments of the fourth quarter. The Pirates didn’t blink, as moments later it was Rori Vesy draining from the corner to prop the Pirates right back up 18-15.
We were just getting started as back-to-back threes from Ireland Shea and Lydia Tymoszczuk launched the Demons back on top, in a wild first half of hoops from Demon Nation! The game would go to half with the Demons ahead 27-23.
It took the Pirates 90 seconds to reclaim the lead in the second half with a bucket by Patti, and then another three ball from Vesy to make it 28-27. The lead lasted all of 5 seconds before Henton buried another three ball from the Demons, to put them right back on top. We were off to the races yet again as both teams just kept bringing it, and the quarter ended with both teams being knotted up at 38. At one point, the Demons held a 7-point lead at 37-30 before the Pirates closed it on an 8-1 run to tie it.
The senior sensation Ava Patti combined with the freshman phenom Olivia Dewey, scored 9 of the fourth quarters first 11 points to spot the Pirates to a sudden 47-40 lead. It was a moment later in which the Pirates stopped Henton, got a nice runout and it appeared that Patti was sandwiched by getting fouled twice on one play from behind and in front of her, however, the officials saw it different and actually called her for a charge as Onunwor stood her ground and took the hit. It was about as big of a bang bang play as you are going to find in High School Girls Basketball. Kudos to Rocky River head coach Jamey Pfahl for keeping his composure, as with the emotion of this game today, it would have been very easy to lose it.
After a perfectly placed left handed layup from Kylie Crane made it 49-42 in favor of the Pirates with only 2:42 left, the Demons had to act fast to extend the game before time ran out. It didn’t start well, as after a quick bucket from Onunwor, they went nearly two minutes without scoring, and it was still River 49-44 with 37 seconds left when Onunwor scored again and got fouled on the drive. Seconds later, with the clocking ticking, it was Lauryn Stanton hitting a three to send Demon nation into a frenzy, and the game into overtime.
From there, the Pirates used strong foul shooting to put the game away in overtime.
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