Hillsdale’s Jaelee Wilson is fouled on a drive to the basket with seven second left. She hit both free throws to give her team a 53-52 lead on their way to a 55-52 win over Aragon.
If there is a measuring stick by which Peninsula Athletic League teams can measure themselves, it is the Aragon girls’ basketball team.
Year in and year out, the Dons are a contender for the PAL South Division title and if a team can manage to knock off the Dons, it is a coup, indeed.
That’s why there was a little bit of celebrating on the Dons home floor by rival Hillsdale Friday night. After leading the entire way, the Knights needed a pair of free throws in the final 10 seconds to escape with a 55-52 win.
“It’s huge,” said Hillsdale head coach Dave Ichiki of the win. “This is confidence (for my team). Especially against Aragon, whose had our number the last couple of years.”
Makena Nitao led the Hillsdale offense, finishing with 16 points. Kira Wilmurt added 14 and Jaelee Wilson added 12 points and five rebounds.
Aragon was led by Megan Grant, who scored a game-high 17 points and grabbed eight rebounds. Mabryn Manu added 10 points for the Dons, while Grace Nai had nine points and eight rebounds.
It’s not like the Knights aren’t used to winning. On the contrary, with Friday’s win, Hillsdale (4-0 PAL, 14-1 overall) stamped itself as a legitimate PAL South title contender.
And despite leading nearly the entire game, the Knights needed a pair of free throws with under 10 seconds remaining to seal the win. Wilson, who scored five of her 12 points in the fourth quarter, drove to the basket and was fouled with just over seven seconds remaining and the Knights trailing 52-51. Wilson stepped to the line and calmly canned both free throws to give the lead back to the Knights, 53-52.
They then stole the ensuing inbound pass. Nitao was fouled and made both shots from the line for the final score of 55-52.
For Aragon head coach Sam Manu, he can only wonder what could have been. His team — minus leading scorer Jordan Beaumont, who averages 16 points per game but missed games this week and one next week due to COVID protocol, despite testing negative five days in a row — did everything but win the game. The Dons dominated the boards, out-rebounding Hillsdale 35-26, with more than half of those (20) coming on the defensive end.
The one thing the Dons couldn’t do consistently was knocked down shots — no matter the length.
They were especially cold at the rim as Aragon (1-1, 8-6) missed 14 layups throughout the game, which helped them burnish their offensive rebounding numbers.
“We missed so many easy baskets,” Manu said. “As bad as we played, we still had a chance.”
The Dons trailed the entire game, with their largest deficit being 11 points, following a driving layup by Hillsdale’s Camryn Low to open the fourth-quarter scoring.
But the Dons kept chipping away. A 6-0 run closed the gap to 48-45 following a Beth Paragan make off of her own miss. When Maddie McGinty drained a 3, the Dons were down just 1, 51-50, with just over a minute left to play.
Aragon’s Grace Nai connects on a floater to give the Dons their first lead of the game, 52-51, with 23 seconds left. The Dons could not hold on, however.
Nathan Mollat/Daily JournalThe Dons came up big defensively on the other end as Nai took a charge on a Nitao drive to the basket with 41 seconds left. Nai then completed the Dons’ comeback when she hit a floater in the lane with 23 seconds left to set up Wilson’s heroics.
While the final minutes presented plenty of drama, it seemed Hillsdale wanted to make the game anything but in the opening half. Showing deadly accuracy on its mid-range game, Hillsdale bolted out to a 9-2 lead to start the game. Wilmurt scored back-to-back buckets to open the scoring for the Knights and when Wilson converted a layup and went 1 for 2 from the line, Hillsdale already had a seven-point lead halfway through the first.
“We know they’re going to try to run off the (3-point) line,” Ichiki said. “We kind of expected them to take away the line.”
But as they would show throughout the game, the Dons hung tough and trailed just 14-8 after one quarter.
It was more of the same in the second quarter: Hillsdale threatening to run away with the game and Aragon scratching and clawing to keep the score close.
When Nitao knocked down a pull-up jumper with 4:55 left in the first half, Hillsdale led 22-13. Aragon kept grinding, however, and by the horn sounded for halftime, Hillsdale’s lead was just six, 27-21.
When Nai hit a 3 midway through the third quarter, the Dons trailed just 34-31. But the Knights responded with a 5-0 spurt to get some breathing room and when Bailey Fong drained a 3 from the corner with under a minute to play in the third, it pushed the Knights’ lead to 44-35 going into the fourth.
“[This win] says a lot about our kids,” Ichiki said. “In past years, we probably would have folded. But now we have more experience and leadership.”
Sports Editor
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