Hermon girls erupt in 2nd half to beat Presque Isle

Hermon is now 10-1 after posting its eighth straight win while Presque Isle, which had won five of its last six, fell to 9-4.

Senior guard Faith Coombs’ 17 points led a balanced attack that produced four players in double figures. She also dished out three assists and grabbed two rebounds.

Senior forward Liz Wyman had 13 points, five rebounds and two assists; senior center Meg Tracy had 10 points and 11 rebounds and senior forward Maddie Lebel registered 10 points and seven rebounds.

Guard Sydney Gallop, also a senior, contributed five rebounds, four points, four assists and three steals.

Presque Isle was led by junior guard Anna Jandreau’s 14 points and five rebounds and senior guard Faith Sjoberg’s 12 points and three steals. Rossalyn Buck grabbed six rebounds off the bench.

“We started to play some good defense in the third quarter and we knocked down some layups and foul shots,” said Hermon coach Chris Cameron. “We missed some high-percentage shots in the first half, we were awful from the foul line (4-for-12) and we weren’t really playing great defense.”

He added that they tightened up on Presque Isle’s shooters, Jandreau and Sjoberg, in the second half in their half-court man-to-man defense and made their high-percentage shots and foul shots.

Hermon held Presque Isle to an 11-for-50 shooting performance from the floor including a 4-for-24 showing from beyond the 3-point arc.

“Playing good defense and taking our time on offense opened everything up [in the second half],” Wyman said. “We knew they [Jandreau and Sjoberg] were going to be tough to guard. We were figuring it out in the first half. We gave them a little bit too much room. But we locked it down in the second half.”

“We closed out hard on them and got into their faces,” Coombs said.

Wyman had nine points during the 18-1 run and Coombs had five points as Hermon transformed a 26-23 lead into a 44-24 advantage.

Wyman said Coombs’ outside shooting complemented their inside scoring.

“Meg and I are big bodies and to have Faith’s outside shooting was a really big help,” Wyman said.

Two free throws by Gallop began the decisive 18-1 spurt with 4:36 left in the half.

Wyman banked home a runner from the middle of the lane and blocked a shot, grabbed the rebound and went the length of the court for a layup.

Lebel then put in her own rebound to make it 34-23.

Jandreau broke Hermon’s 8-0 run with a free throw but Wyman finished off a pretty passing sequence involving Allie Cameron and Gallop and added a free throw a minute later before Coombs’ jumper and 3-pointer made it 42-24 after three periods.

Wyman opened the fourth quarter with a pair of foul shots to cap the flurry.

The taller Hawks outrebounded Presque Isle 38-21.

Hermon led just 17-15 at the intermission as both teams struggled from the floor.

Sjoberg’s 3-pointer early in the second quarter gave Presque Isle its only lead of the game at 18-17 but Hermon responded with six straight points to take a lead it would never relinquish on two Tracy free throws, Lebel’s layup off a Coombs pass and Gallop’s offensive rebound basket following a Lebel miss.

Hermon shot 20-for-39 from the floor with a 5-for-11 performance from long range.