Cameron Ousts Madonna for Spot in Title Game
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CAMERON -- In her first season as Cameron girls basketball coach, Holly Pettit is taking the Dragons back to the OVAC Class 1A championship. And the Dragons did so in impressive fashion Monday night in a semifinal matchup against Madonna. Pettit's squad finished the first quarter on a 14-1 run, overcame a Blue Dons spurt along with battling some foul trouble in a 48-36 victory at Cameron High School.
The Dragons will face Beallsville for the 1A title 2 p.m. Saturday at Ohio University Eastern. The Blue Devils defeated Hundred in the other Class 1A semifinal.
Cameron will look for their second conference title in school history. The Dragons won their first one back in 2018 under Roger Cain.
"I told the girls before the game looking up at the banner. There's one year that they won the OVAC championship," Pettit said. "I was like, 'We want our name and our year up on there. Obviously Beallsville is a very tough team. They have some really good basketball players. I'm ready to play them again. We'll prepare this week and hopefully we can get that year up on the banner."
And to get to the championship game took a little work. With the Dragons up 23-9 midway through the second, the Blue Dons put together a small 9-0 spurt to get within striking distance. A free throw by Anna Backel put the score at 23-18 with 35 seconds to go in the first half. Aubre Cain-Loy, though, gave the Dragons a little momentum with a bucket with 7 seconds remaining.
"I told them that the first quarter was great" Pettit said. "We were boxing out and getting offensive and defensive rebounds. We were jumping out, jamming the cutters and not letting the girls get to the basket. In the second quarter we got a little bit lazy They were getting some offensive rebounds and that's when they started making their way back. At halftime, I said we had to make some adjustments and we got to get back to the game we know. Keep the intensity up and play fundamental basketball. And they did. I'm really proud of the girls. They played really well as a team lately."
It's true. Coming out of halftime, the Dragons scored 11 of the first 12 points to take a commanding 36-19 lead with 3:25 left in the third.
But a little adversity was there for the Dragons too. Lili Neely, who finished the night with a game-high 17 points was battling foul trouble throughout the night. She picked up her fourth foul with 6:04 left in the third quarter. Both her and Reagan Gray also had three fouls going into halftime.
"Lili and Reagan Gray, who is our best defender, I put her on ((Jazzy) Melnyk. We knew she was going to drive to the basket and Reagan did a phenomenal job on defense," Pettit said. "I would put her up against anybody. She'd run through a brick wall if I asked her to. She's just one of those hard-nose basketball players. We got in foul trouble and that's what you're going to get when you play aggressive defense. The other girls stepped up and took care of things."
A Kendra Dobbs 3-pointer gave the Dragons their largest lead of the night (39-21) with 1:10 remaining. And while the Blue Dons were able to score the final four points of the third, the hole was just too big to climb out of.
Melnyk finished with a team-high 14 points.
"I think there was two or three keys to this game," Madonna coach Rodney Boniti said. "One, I think Cameron attacked the offensive board extremely aggressive. The second or third chance points made a huge difference, especially in the first half. Th second thing is how we had mental breakdowns on the defensive end on basic zone defenses. They were able to get dribble penetration against a zone is unheard of. We had some breakdowns on our rotations and our spots. Those I thought were two of the biggest differences. And the last thing, quiet honestly, we just got beat to loose balls. When you get beat with intensity in a game like this, you're not going to win."
Maelyn Canada also cracked double digits for Cameron as she supplied 12 points.