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Lady Mavs season ends

The North Country Lady Mavericks’ 2018-19 season came to an abrupt end last weekend as the team fell to the Plentywood Wildcats and MonDak Thunder in the Eastern C Divisional Tournament.

“Overall it was a very fun season,” Lady Mavericks Head Coach Amber Erickson told the PCN. “The kids worked hard all season long and got along really well. I’m excited to see where we go from here. They need to get in the gym in the offseason to do some individual work and I think we could turn the corner and go from a good team to a great team here in the next year or so.”

The Lady Mavericks faced shooting woes in their tournament opener against Plentywood on Wednesday, February 20. North Country shot 10-of-55 (18.2%) from the field and lost 42-28.

“We just struggled to put the ball in the hole that day,” Coach Erickson said. “We took a lot of shots and I thought they were good shots, we just couldn’t get them to fall; not even layups.”

Sophomore Kia Wasson led North Country with 12 points, nine rebounds, and seven steals. Kaitlyn McColly had five points, five steals, four rebounds, and three assists. Jaycee Erickson had four points and three assists. Kelsee Cummings had four points and three rebounds.

“I thought the girls played hard despite the frustration of not being able to hit shots,” Coach Erickson said. “They kept at it and they played hard the whole game and they did a really nice job trying to get back in it when we started pressing in the fourth quarter.”

The Lady Mavericks forced 21 turnovers and only turned the ball over 10 times. Plentywood outrebounded North Country 49 to 30.

Plentywood outscored North Country in three of four quarters. The scores were 18-6 in the first, 6-2 in the second, and 12-6 in the third. North Country scored 14 points in the fourth, while holding Plentywood to six.

“It was the combination of playing in a divisional tournament and these kids don’t have a lot of tournament experience yet, so I think they were almost too amped up and rushed a lot of stuff,” Coach Erickson said.

The loss to Plentywood set up the Lady Mavericks against MonDak in the opening round of the consolation tournament on Thursday, February 21. The Lady Mavericks lost 55-53. The Mavericks led by three with 1:15 remaining, before MonDak’s Brynn Folvag hit a game-tying trey. Elizabeth Field would score the game winning field goal with two seconds remaining.

McColly led the Mavericks in scoring with 20 points. Wasson posted a 15 point, 15 rebound double-double. Wasson also led in assists with three. Jaycee Erickson had 11 points, six steals, and four rebounds.

“We shot the ball a lot better for sure,” Coach Erickson said. “I think we relaxed a little bit more, didn’t play so tight, and didn’t rush our shots.”

Danika Soper had three points, Cummings had two points and Elise Strommen had two points.

The Lady Mavs jumped out to a 18-6 lead in the first but were unable to hold on to their lead falling behind 28-26 at the conclusion of the first half.

“We kind of had that nemesis of putting together three quarters in a game and we have talked about how we need to put four great quarters together to beat great teams,” Coach Erickson said. “In the first quarter we came out and did a lot of great things defensively. We rebounded well. Something we haven’t been able to do is pick up full court pressure all season long because of fear of foul trouble and wearing ourselves down.”

Both teams scored 16 points in the third period and 11 in the fourth period. There were nine lead changes and six ties.

North Country shot better against MonDak going 19-of-49 from the field (38.8%). The Lady Mavericks reached the free throw line for 21 attempts and only hit on nine of those attempts. MonDak was 4-of-12 (33.3%) from the charity stripe.

“We had a lot of missed opportunities at the free throw line that could have sealed the deal for us,” Coach Erickson said.

 

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