The Coginchaug Girls Basketball team traveled to Bethel High School to take on the No. 5 ranked Wildcats on Friday, March 3 in the second round of the Class M State Tournament. The girls knew this game would be difficult, lacking their center starter Carly Lane, forcing them to fight harder than they already had this season.

The girls got off to a slow start, trailing by as much as 10 in the first quarter. The Wildcats had many tall players that were very easily capable of intercepting passes and blocking shots. The girls were forced to adjust to this disadvantage and managed to end the quarter trailing 10-16. The second quarter showed a similar struggle for the girls which allowed the Wildcats to go up 26-19 at the half.

Things were very stagnant in the third quarter, neither team able to get anything on the board for the better part of six minutes. The Devils took advantage of this drought and cut the lead to only four points with two minutes remaining in the quarter. This extra effort came from junior captain Ginny Benbow who dug deeper to force turnovers for Bethel which allowed her to put four quick points on the board for the Devils. But Bethel responded and quickly built their lead to 12. A quick three by Halligan and a fouled 3-point attempt by King allowed the girls to stay in the game, trailing 27-33 to enter the fourth quarter.

The pace of the fourth quarter increased drastically, and the girls were not able to keep up with the high scoring by Bethel. As a result, the Devils had to start fouling the Wildcats, who did not miss any shots from the foul line. Eventually, time caught up with the Devils, and the girls put in their two seniors Lauren Melchionne and Paige Copeland to get a piece of the action one more time before the time expired.

The end of this season, however, will not be detrimental to the Devils in terms of next year. Their starting lineup is comprised of only sophomores and juniors, and they also have many freshmen players who contribute to the team on varsity. This extra year together can help the girls develop into a tougher team to be the best they can be. Junior co-captain Ashleigh Halligan claimed, “We’ve all been playing varsity since our freshman year, and we hope that by the time we’re seniors, we will be functioning as efficiently as possible.”