Andover Edges Out Girls’ Basketball
This past weekend, the girls’ varsity basketball team lost to their rivals, Andover, in a tough game, which snapped their seven-game winning streak. Although Exeter had been winning for most of the game, Andover was able to take control in the final minutes and win, 42-46.
The first half of the game was exciting, both teams staying neck and neck with the other. Eventually, it was Big Red that broke away, separating themselves from the opposition; going into halftime, the girls held onto a 27-20 lead, but they knew that they could not get complacent in the next half if they wanted to win.
In the second half of the game, Andover proved to be quite a challenge, hanging in the game and edging on a comeback. Exeter’s coach, Assistant Principal Ronald Kim, commented on the opposition’s style of play. “Andover is well coached, has a balanced team, and they play hard,” he said.
The determined Andover squad fought back and tied the game up with a few minutes to go. Exeter was not able to keep up with the momentum that their rivals had gained and ended up losing by just four points.
On a positive note, Big Red had played good defense, which had helped them gain the lead during the first half. The girls were able to communicate with each other while defending, and they forced a handful of turnovers by working well together.
Lower Charlotte Polk expanded on the team’s strong defense. “We are a defensive team,”she said. “We are pretty good on offense, but we really grit it out on defense.”
“We’re just going to keep working hard, with a chip on our shoulder, and go into E/a remembering what this feels like.”
Polk also explained, “Coach works us really hard in practice for defense, and we do a lot of defensive slides.” The hard defensive practices are paying off because Exeter has held their opponents to 50 points or less for almost all of their games.
Exeter’s downfall came from the lack of offense in the second half. One of the troubles they faced was not running the plays they had practiced. Without teamwork and structure, the girls found it hard to put up points against Andover. The girls feel confident that this simple offensive mistake can easily be fixed by the time they play their rival again.
The majority of the baskets that Exeter scored could be credited to specific individual efforts. One of the main offensive contributors was captain and senior Peace Kabari, who had yet another stellar performance, scoring a bunch of key points. The team has only six regular season games left, and they hope to win them all. The girls believe that the loss to Andover definitely does not portray their skill or the hard work that they have put in.
“We’re just going to keep working hard, with a chip on our shoulder, and go into E/a remembering what this feels like,” upper Bella Edo said. “The whole season is about beating Andover so that’s what we’re going to do our best to do.”