It was an ugly game, and at this time of the year we'll take an ugly win.
Both teams had setbacks tonight and both teams were playing with mix and match rotations. We lost Sydney Santora early in the 2nd quarter to an injury and on her senior night Amelia Brown picked up three early fouls and had to sit, then early in the 3rd, Briana picked up her fourth foul. Springfield was in a similar situation. Fortunately for us, Ava Culler got into early foul trouble and sat for the 2nd quarter and in the 3rd quarter Daniels picked up her fourth foul and both missed more of the game than I'm sure Dave would have liked.

Not surprisingly, it ended up being a very competitive game. Before the game we stressed to the girls that we need to come out strong. We beat them by 17 the first time around, but we also shot extremely well that game. Tonight that was not the case. We were 28% from the free throw line and 22% from beyond the arc. The two bright spots coming out of tonight's game were that we won while shooting poorly and with the injury to Syd and foul trouble with Amelia and Bri, we had two girls come off the bench and give us big minutes. The biggest reason we won was that one of our freshman, Maddie Broderick, came off of the bench and in her first meaningful minutes in a long time, knocked down three 3's in the 2nd quarter. That gave us some much needed breathing room. Our other Maddie, Maddie Rossiter gave us strong minutes in the middle of our defense, which was needed against Cullen.
I can't say enough about Dani Brusha, once again, she was the leader on the court offensively, defensively and as a calming influence. With Syd out and Springfield threatening late in the game, she just settled the team down. I'm hoping that our younger girls watch how she carries herself in these pressure situations and learns from her.
You always would rather win easier if you could, but I was proud of the way that we were able to close out the game and hopefully we can continue to improve as we get ready for the post season.
I want to give a shout out to Springfield, they've been playing really well recently and you can see how much well they're playing together. They came out hungry tonight and almost spoiled our senior night and that's a reflection of the job Dave is doing with his girls.