yOu hATe mY tEam
People are mad at the spreadsheet again.
Saturday's schedule was a light one, especially south of Bangor, so after catching some of the Busline Championships in Belfast, I headed over to the Lincoln Academy and Medomak girls game.
My expectations weren't high. Medomak won the earlier matchup by 10 and the word on the street was that Lincoln Academy had some injury issues and they sure did. The "injured and unable to play" introductions were a M*A*S*H* unit, so when Medomak went up 10-2 and Lincoln point guard Rowan Coffin was already on the bench in foul trouble, it seemed like it might be a wrap.
Lincoln managed to stop the bleeding and kept the game in the 6-9 range until they hit a couple of free throws to get it to 4 at the half. It was not a good half of basketball.
Early in the third quarter, Medomak pushed the lead back to 9 behind a couple of buckets from Kytana Williamson. Mariam DeLisle answered with a 3, then another one. Then Ysabelle Bhe hit one. Williamson answered and a Kennedie Anderson triple tied the game at 32 and suddenly we've got a ball game.
Lillian Labrie's free throw gave Lincoln Academy their first lead of the game at the end of the third quarter. The teams went back and forth in the final quarter, with DeLisle (who I think is close to 1,000 points) and Williamson doing the heavy lifting and Lincoln going into what appeared to be a quasi-stall, which was weird up 1 with several minutes to play, but I think they were maybe trying to shorted the game a little?
Chloe Fox's free throw to tie the game and steal to get the ball back set up Williamson to hit this circus shot to give Medomak the lead and make her the all-time leading scorer in program history, passing Julie Littlefield ('92), who had 1,034. Josh Nash's school record of 1,798 remains safe.
The teams traded free throws after that. Williamson hit two to push the Medomak lead to 4.
Then things got interesting. Mariam DeLisle hit a 3 with some small amount of time left. Don Shields thought it was 1.6 seconds. My brother thought it was less than 1 second. Somehow Lincoln Academy managed to get a timeout before the buzzer sounded and the refs put 2 seconds on the clock. Lincoln fouled Williamson with 0.4 on the clock (just enough for a catch and shoot!). She made one of two to give her 30 on the night and the Eagles couldn't get a shot off. Medomak survived 48-46. Mariam DeLisle finished with 23 & 9.
With the loss, Lincoln Academy's odds of a bye are down to 19% (they're 94.4% to make at least a prelim). We know that Spruce, Medomak, and Oceanside will be the top 3 in B South, Biddeford will be the 4 and Wells will be the 5, but 6-11 is very much a mess
Elsewhere
Ben Burgess led Buckfield with 16 points in their win over Vinalhaven, who got 19 from Hunter Hamilton...Jaxson Desjardins dropped 27 on Islesboro...Addison Chaisson had 22 to lead Forest Hills in the girls game....Marie Benoit went for 27 in Hall-Dale's win over Monmouth...Oak Hill got 23 from Mackenzee Wardwell to beat Lisbon...Mollie Puffer's 18 led Sanford to a comfortable win over Greely...Thadon Gentle had 19 in Houlton's win over Bapst...Caribou used a 20-9 fourth quarter to put away MDI.
Today in "yOu hATe mY tEam"
Look, if you don't want to subscribe to the site, you don't have to. But this is stupid. And a weird choice of a team I "give no love to". You don't have a problem with the coverage of your team. You're just trying to create drama and animosity where none exists. I'm not sure what you get out of that, but whatever. You do you.
Also there are more than 250 teams in the state of Maine. It's a lot to keep track of.
Anyway, if you enjoy this coverage, today is a great day to upgrade!
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Here's your updated Power Rankings.
And the girls. Hey, look! It's Lawrence!
I was going to have a new podcast today with the updated rankings and a Mr. & Miss Basketball straw poll, but the day got away from me, which is to say that'll probably come tomorrow and if you're reading this and haven't sent me your Mr. Basketball rankings, do that today!
Let's update the Wins Draft standings. I wonder if anyone drafted the Lawrence girls?
Oh right. I did.
Turns out having local people doing the local news is important. Who could have possibly guessed?
Awesome.
So this is a new one.
I think I knew this because I was a kid who read rule books and arcane trivia and other such things, but had forgotten because can you imagine?
But, yeah, that's a rule. SI has more.
Much like the section of the MPA handbook that says they can keep a team out of the playoffs, this is one of those rules that's there just in case a team does something insane, like someone on the bench tackling someone or a team starting fights in the parking lot (but not scoring too many points). You never expect to need it, but it's there in case of emergency.
The fact that they had to threaten to invoke it is insane.
The Madawaska boys are undefeated, but still the 4 seed in C North because they've played arguably the easiest schedule in the state. But they've also got the best point differential in the state. They're only 47th because the schedule is so bad.
But they've dominated that schedule. They've got the 3rd best %Perfect in the state.
One of those games was against Fort Kent in a game they won by 31, so I don't feel great about the Model picking Fort Kent to win this.
But it's also a cancer fundraiser!
The Model's picks for the rest of today's games are after the jump.