By Mike Violette
If you follow high school basketball at all in Maine, you know that the Lawrence Girls sailed through the regular season this year. They won all 18 games they played, most of them by double digits and I’m talking BIG double digits. Only two of their wins were less than double digits and those came against two very quality opponents. The Class AA Oxford Hills Vikings and Lawrence’s chief rival in Class A North, the Cony Rams (now out of the tournament as well). AND, one of Lawrence’s double-digit wins came vs Wednesday’s opponent, Camden Hills back on January 22nd, when they beat the Windjammers, 68-54. I just happened to broadcast that game and it was a much closer game than the final score might indicate and clearly Camden Hills took something positive from that game and Wednesday afternoon it showed at the Augusta Civic Center. Camden never trailed.., let me repeat that.., Camden NEVER trailed in beating previously undefeated Lawrence fairly easily 64-56. But you know what? THIS game wasn’t that close and in fact it was mostly a double-digit win for the Jammers. They roared out to a 16-9 lead after the first quarter and never looked back. They scored the first 5 points in the game and held Lawrence off the board for the first 2 1/2 minutes of the game before Maddie Provost hit a 3 to get Lawrence on the board. Later on in the quarter, Ashley Shores hit a driving dipsy do of a shot and was fouled, made the free throw and cut the CH lead to 11-9. At that point I thought.., “well here they go, I hope CH enjoyed their little fun in the 1st quarter.” Well, I couldn’t have been more wrong because the Windjammers responded by running off the next 5 points including a Leah Jones 3 pointer and they led 16-9 after 8 minutes.
Lawrence played better in the 2nd quarter.., somewhat at least. They hung tough and got a Shores driving layup to cut the margin to 4 at 21-17 but CH responded yet again (sensing a common theme here, are ya?) and bumped the lead up to again late in the 2nd before Maddie Provost hit a fadeaway pop at the buzzer and the score at the half was Camden Hills 26 Lawrence 20. My 1st half notes from the game said this: “Lawrence looks flat” “not trying to run” “very careless with the basketball” “Camden Hills looks like the hungrier team” A Lawrence fan stopped by where I was sitting and said.., “man, they just don’t seem to have it today.., something is off with them.” I couldn’t have agreed more. BUT, I have seen this team have the capability of turning the switch on and off all year and frankly.., I expected them to turn on and go off like they have all year with runs like 17-0, 13-0 and 11-0 in games that The Score has done.
Well.., here’s one word to describe the possibility of my observation about Lawrence “turning the switch on” in this game. NOPE! To the contrary it was Camden Hills turning it on and being the team running out to a double-digit lead in the 3rd quarter. Tallulah Marks and Provost traded treys but then Thea Laukka picked Maddie Provost’s pocket and hit a lay up followed by a Rose Tohanczyn lay up and low and behold.., guess who led by double digits? Yup, The Camden Hills Windjammers. CH was giving Lawrence a dose of it’s own medicine and led by double digits after 3, 44-33 and if it wasn’t official yet.., it was official now. Lawrence was in trouble.
If Lawrence was going to stay unbeaten and live to play another day it was going to take one heckuva comeback. There was a comeback.., but.., as it would turn out, it wasn’t enough. Camden Hills took their largest lead at 50-36 with 4:49 to go and Lawrence looked cooked. BUT, Lawrence went on a 9-2 run helped out by a Lilly Gray 3 pointer and pulled within 52-47 with a minute 52 to go. A glimmer of Bulldog hope here? Not so much, Lawrence had to begin fouling and CH made their free throws, 4 straight to be exact and the lead was back up to a more comfortable 56-47. Maddie Provost hit a couple of 3’s to get the deficit down to 6 on 2 different occasions but that was that and the dream season of the once undefeated Lawrence Bulldogs came to a nightmarish end. And it ended not because the Bulldogs shot poorly although they did only shoot 36% to CH’s 42%.., it ended because it seemed as if the Windjammers got every loose ball, every big rebound in the game.
Leah Jones, Rose Tohanczyn and Thea Laukka were a three headed monster for CH. Jones had 18 including 8 of 12 from the foul line. Tohanczyn had 16 points and 9 huge rebounds and Laukka had 16 points, 6 rebounds and 6 assists in leading Samantha Bragg’s team to the regional finals. Maddie Provost caught fire and had half of Lawrence’s points with 28 on just 10 for 26 from the floor but just one other player for the Dogs was in double figures and that was Lilly Gray who had 12.
Oh.., what could’ve been.
