By GARLAND KENNEDY
Sentinel Sports Editor
A fourth-quarter comeback propelled the Mt. Edgecumbe High Lady Braves basketball team to a 50-41 win against Sitka High Tuesday night at MEHS. It was the final match of the regular season for the traditional cross-town rivals prior to the regional tournament next month.
Following the girls game, Edgecumbe’s boys downed the Sitka Wolves 59-42.
Sitka High’s Mecca Goldsberry drives against Mt. Edgecumbe’s Bessie Williams, Feb. 2 at Sitka High. The teams played again Tuesday. Edgecumbe won, sealing a 3-1 regular season record against the Lady Wolves. (Sentinel photo)
The Lady Wolves opened the night strong and held a 2-point lead at the half. Accurate shooting from Nai’a Nelson and Ava Brady kept the home team at bay for a time, but the Lady Braves lit up in the fourth quarter. In the final eight minutes on the court, Edgecumbe scored 21 points to Sitka’s 9 as the Lady Braves’ defense held tight and their offense kicked into gear.
A decisive showing on offense by Edgecumbe’s Carliese O’Brien, Tessa Anderson and Bessie Williams gave their team a small lead as the last quarter wore on. Overall, Anderson, a junior from Sitka, led Edgecumbe’s scoreboard with 14 points, followed by O’Brien with 12 and Williams with 8.
In hindsight, Anderson credited much of the win to her team’s determination.
“Just keep pushing, and keep our patience and our composure… (It) feels good. We worked hard for it. We’ve just got to keep our heads in the game, though… Keep our teamwork up, keep up our spirit and not let anything get to our heads,” Anderson told the Sentinel after the game.
Tuesday’s matchup was the fourth time the rival teams have played this season. Sitka won the season opener and Edgecumbe won the remaining three, though all have been close.
Brooke Markoff, a sophomore from Togiak, emphasized the importance of hard work on the court.
“We’ve just got to keep pushing and believe in ourselves,” Markoff said.
With only a month left in the regular season, she said her team needs to improve their “consistency and just working as a team, keep our fundamentals strong.”
The team’s talent sometimes doesn’t come out until the decisive moment of a game, said Lady Braves coach Candis Cook.
“Sometimes our girls forget how good they really are, and the strength and the skill that they possess. So when it comes down to the wire, the last, final minutes, we normally go with our strengths,” she said. This is Cook’s first season as the Lady Braves’ head coach.
With the Eastern Conference tournament just around the corner, Cook said the team still has much work to do.
“Still taking care of the ball, making the easy shots, our rotations on defense… The biggest thing right now that I feel like we’re doing well is not giving up. The girls are continually fighting. They’re continually working to get better.”
On the opposite side of the court, Sitka’s Nai’a Nelson said her team will need to control the ball – and the tempo – if they want to beat Edgecumbe in the tournament.
“The team who is willing to slow themselves down, be poised, be strong with the ball and take care of it, that team is always going to have the upper hand,” Nelson said. “Because if you’re just throwing the ball around, you know, getting wild, then it just comes down to how the other team’s going to play. If you fall into the other team’s momentum, then you lose.”
She said she sees the season’s third loss to Edgecumbe as a motivator to the Lady Wolves.
“Edgecumbe’s a tough team this year and they bring it,” she said. “All that does for us is it pushes us harder.”
Sitka coach Mindy Bartolaba noted a solid initial performance from her team, but things gave way in the final quarter.
“We played three really great quarters, three tough quarters,” the coach said. “And as we were going into the fourth we knew this game was going to be close, and we knew their defense was tough… Fourth quarter pressure got to us a little bit there. And so that just gave us motivation to get back to work. It could have been anybody’s game.”
Mt. Edgecumbe earned a win in the boys game that followed, resulting in the same 3-1 regular season record over Sitka as the Lady Braves.
The SHS boys led in the first quarter, but the Braves pushed back in the second and led 32-24 at the half. Although the Wolves outscored MEHS in the third, the Braves came back in strong final quarter, securing the win with 19 points to Sitka’s 6. Ranen Wassillie netted 25 points for the Braves, followed by Jake Friske with 11 and Miles Bourdukofsky with 9.
Wassillie said his team has improved since their last rivalry game.
“Today, we really turned down our turnovers, and we were a lot more consistent than all our other games. Felt pretty good. I felt pretty good,” the senior said, adding: “Our full court defense is pretty good. Work on it, polish it more and maybe even work on our passing cuts.”
Sitka played a good game, he said. “A big part of it is they’ve got a pretty good hustle. That’s a big part of it, just the hustle.”
Wassillie, a senior, said he has high hopes for the region and state competition coming up. “I feel pretty good. I want to try my hardest to make it to state. Just try my hardest to get it up to the boys,” he said.
The Braves maintained control of the pacing of the match and used that to prevent any comeback by the Wolves, senior Miles Bourdukofsky said.
“It went good, because we had more control of the tempo, we were more consistent, and we played pretty good defense,”
Like Wassillie, Bourdukofsky is eager for the opportunity to play at the state level one more time.
“It’s pretty good. I’d say the same thing as Ranen – got to try our hardest because it’s our last year,” he said.
While the cross-bridge rivals won’t play again until March Madness, both teams will face Kenai this week at home, followed by games against Redington High next week.
