Uniontown girls fall to bellefonte
STATE COLLEGE – The Lady Raiders won their fist PIAA playoff game Saturday at State College High School, but it wasn’t the Uniontown Lady Raiders. Instead, the Bellefonte Lady Raiders turned the trick with a 48-33 win over Uniontown. Bellefonte improved to 20-7 on the season by winning their first ever state tournament game. Uniontown fell to 16-11, but have nothing to hang their heads about, according to coach Jason Winfrey.
“We had a great season,” Winfrey said. “We won a WPIAL game and made states. Our girls didn’t play their best game today, but they fought hard the whole way. They should be proud of themselves.”
On this day, Uniontown came out of the gates slowly and didn’t score its first field goal until Annie Hodge scored to make it 13-5 40 seconds into the second quarter. Bellefonte scored the next six points to go ahead 19-5 on its way to a 24-8 halftime lead.
“We dug ourselves a pretty deep hole, plus we had some girls in foul trouble,” Winfrey said of the first half. “We had no continuity in the first half. Bellefonte did a good job of keeping us out of rhythm. The second half, we were able to establish a rhythm and made a little run at them.”
Bellefonte extended its lead to 30-10 midway through the third quarter, but Uniontown closed to within 36-24 to force a Bellefonte timeout with 6:10 remaining. Uniontown made it a 10-point game twice, 38-28 and 40-30 and got as close as nine, 42-33, on a Lawren Davis three-pointer with 3:10 to play, but that would be Uniontown’s last score.
“We played a typical first half,” Bellefonte coach Tina Gaughan said. “In the second half, Uniontown came out with a lot of intensity and we were a little flat, maybe tired. They really have tough guards and they played us very physically.
“Of course, we were concerned when they cut our lead to nine, but our girls have been through this all season. We like to make it exciting, I guess.”
Cassie Proper led Bellefonte with 12 points, while sister Angie chipped in with 11 and Carina Struble added 10. Uniontown got 11 from Davis.
“Playing a PIAA game was a great experience for our girls,” Winfrey said. “Today, Bellefonte executed better than we did and made more shots than we did. We made too many errors (22 turnovers).
“We’re definitely a young team and this was terrific for our younger girls, but I’m really proud of our seniors. They fought through a lot of adversity over the last four years, but they are going out as winners, not as losers.”