AUGUSTA — There will be a new girls basketball champion in Western Class D this season.
No. 3 seed Forest Hills — which returned just a few seasoned players from last year’s regional championship team — struggled to find its footing throughout in a 49-35 quarterfinal loss to No. 6 Searsport at the Augusta Civic Center on Tuesday afternoon.
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The Tigers were held to 14-of-45 shooting from the field, turned the ball over 21 times and were outrebounded 30-20 for the contest.
“I don’t think we came out focused, ready or mentally ready to get after it,” Forest Hills coach Mike LeBlanc said. “We can’t have a letdown like that at the Civic Center, you’ve got to come out ready to go.
“They knew they were going to be a good team, I’ve told them all along that we had to come ready to play and I just don’t think we did. Nothing they did (was that) spectacular that our guys didn’t know what they were going to do.”
While neither team did a particularly great job of taking care of the basketball, ultimately a pair of standout performances for the Vikings — one from Anna Bucklin in the first half and another from Melinda Ogden in the second — made the difference.
Searsport held a 6-4 advantage with less than 2 minutes remaining in the opening quarter when Bucklin got back-to-back buckets in the paint to give the Vikings a six-point lead heading into the second.
From there the Vikings opened on an 8-3 run to take an 18-7 lead midway through the quarter. Bucklin scored eight of her 12 points in the second to lead the Vikings to a 23-14 lead at the half.
“She has great interior moves, but she’s just 5-foot-5. She’s not a big player but she thinks she is,” Searsport coach Melvin Grant said. “It was amazing because it hasn’t happened for us a lot this year.
“(Ogden) is usually in the game and usually doesn’t get in foul trouble. Today she was in foul trouble and Anna just absolutely took over the game. It was enormous. It was the turning point of the game, really.”
Forest Hills never managed to cut the deficit below nine points in the second half and Ogden was a big reason why. She scored 18 of her game-high 21 points in the second frame.
“She is one of the best around, you can’t deny it,” Grant said. “When she’s on, there is not a better shooter.”
Forest Hills ratcheted up its pressure in the second half and was more aggressive in shooting from the outside, yet could never close the gap. Keely Taylor and Caitlin Logston paced the Tigers with eight points each, while Haley Cuddy finished with six.
“We knew Ogden was a good shooter, the (Brittany) Ward girl was a good shooter (and that they would) full court press,” LeBlanc said. “Everything they did we knew was coming, we just weren’t ready mentally to get going. We dug ourselves a hole and just couldn’t get out of it.”
Evan Crawley — 621-5640
ecrawley@mainetoday.com
Twitter: @Evan_Crawley
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