BANGOR, Maine — The Oxford Hills girls basketball team made the 125-mile journey to Bangor from South Paris to take on the Bangor High School Rams in an important Class AA North contest at the Red Barry Gym on Tuesday night.
And Tianna Sugars and Erin Morton made sure the trip home on the yellow school bus seemed a lot shorter as Sugars poured in a 19 points and grabbed 14 rebounds, both game-highs, and Morton contributed 17 points and two assists as the Vikings triumphed 56-46.
It was the 12-3 Vikings’ seventh straight and it avenged their last loss, 42-32 to Bangor on Jan. 5.
Erin Eastman added eight points for the winners.
Katie Butler had 15 points, eight rebounds, six steals and two assists for 8-7 Bangor. Sarah Bragg also had 15 points and Emily Gilmore contributed 10 points and seven rebounds.
After spotting the Rams a 9-3 lead, the Vikings took control of the game by outscoring cold-shooting Bangor 13-2 the rest of the half and then scoring the first seven points of the second half to build a 23-11 lead.
Bangor went 1-for-9 from the floor in the second quarter.
Oxford Hills led by as much as 16 before staving off a Ram rally in the fourth quarter which saw them pull within eight on four occasions.
But Oxford Hills hit its free throws down the stretch to hold them off.
“We came ready to play,” said junior guard Morton. “We played well. We didn’t fast break a lot in the first half but we did in the second half and it opened it up for us.”
“We didn’t rebound as well as I would have liked but when we got rebounds, we got some long easy looks [off outlet passes on the fast break],” said Oxford Hills coach Nate Pelletier.
The Vikings abandoned their 2-3 zone in the first half in favor of a player-to-player because “they were lighting up the zone,” explained Pelletier.
“They have some pretty good shooters and we were able to get out on them in the man-to-man. We have some of the most athletic kids in the league but you have to get them in the right spots so they’re defending the right kids. They understood their roles and did a really good job tonight,” added Pelletier.
The defense not only forced the Rams into a 32.1 percent shooting performance from the floor, it also created a lot of turnovers.
“They went on a pretty good run and we kind of handed it to them. We had a lot of turnovers we shouldn’t have had. They hit their shots and we didn’t box out very well so they got a lot of rebounds they shouldn’t have,” said senior guard Gilmore.
“We gave up too many breakaway layups,” said Bangor coach Joe Johnson.
Sugars had eight points during the 13-2 run in the first half and Morton’s 3-pointer, Eastman’s layup off an Allyssa Hanley pass and Jayden Colby’s steal and layup opened the second half.
Bangor went nine minutes without a basket until Bragg hit a 3-pointer with 5:20 left in the third quarter.
“We went through a little dry patch and dug ourselves a hole we couldn’t get out of,” said Bangor junior Butler. “We didn’t value the basketball as much as we could have. But I was proud of the way we battled back.”