{"id":47445,"date":"2024-03-14T16:33:39","date_gmt":"2024-03-14T16:33:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelandmark.com\/?p=47445"},"modified":"2024-03-14T16:33:39","modified_gmt":"2024-03-14T16:33:39","slug":"girls-basketball-captures-final-four-berth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/2024\/03\/14\/girls-basketball-captures-final-four-berth\/","title":{"rendered":"Girls' basketball captures Final Four berth"},"content":{"rendered":"
By John Orrell<\/em>
\nLandmark Correspondent<\/em><\/div>\n

HOLDEN \u2014 The Wachusett Regional High girls\u2019 basketball team inched one step closer to its collective goal \u2014 a Division 1 state championship \u2014 with a 67-44 victory over No. 7 seed visitors Weymouth High on March 7, played before a jam-packed audience. The quarterfinal win earned the No. 2 seed Mountaineer girls (23-0) a berth in the Final Four entering their matchup with Springfield Central played earlier this week.<\/p>\n

The 2023-2024 season marks the third consecutive campaign in which the green and white have captured the MIAA Division 1 Final Four trophy. Wachusett fell to Andover in last year\u2019s semifinals and at press time was looking to reverse that trend, which would give the program its first state championship.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been playing together since freshman year. It\u2019s exciting, but it\u2019s not over yet,\u201d said senior co-captain Liz Cain, all smiles. \u201cWe try to help each other out. We\u2019re so excited to be going back to the semifinals. Everyone on the team wants a state championship, and we\u2019re going to work really hard to get it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an honor and a privilege to be able to coach these kids\u201d said WRHS head coach Jim Oxford. \u201cOur players are smart. They work hard and take what they learn individually and they bring it to these games. They did that tonight. They were ready to go.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Wachusett Regional High girls’ varsity basketball has made it to the Final 4 in the race for a Division 1 state championship. Photo Credit: Timothy Orrell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Sending it up to score against Weymouth High. Photo Credit: Timothy Orrell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWeymouth has two real big kids (6-foot-1 Megan Doyle and 6-4 Callie Flynn) who are really good players, and we had our kids ready to do what they had to do to contain them. They\u2019re really excellent basketball players. A lot of prep went into this game. We had a brief first quarter lapse on our part. We did what we were supposed to do, and that\u2019s what happens when we do what we\u2019re supposed to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone works so hard at practice and puts in 100% effort every single day,\u201d added US Naval Academy-bound Mary Gibbons. \u201cOur coaches spend so much time studying game film. They don\u2019t have time for their families this time of year because they\u2019re so focused on winning. We\u2019re very fortunate to have coaches like this who are dedicated to reaching our goal of winning a state championship.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe knew they had a size advantage, but we\u2019ve played against big kids before,\u201d said senior co-captain Hannah Best.<\/p>\n

Not lost in all of the postgame celebration was the athleticism of sophomore Jaelynn Scott, who was a force at both ends of the court. Her presence on the court and the spark she added to an already stout lineup could not be overlooked. Her defense created a series of breakaway opportunities that resulted in points for the home team.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last game I don\u2019t think she got off to the start that we expected to see from her, so tonight she was ready,\u201d Oxford said of Scott\u2019s contributions on the night. \u201cWhen Jae gets off like, that she\u2019s a problem defensively. She came out ready to play.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just so proud of her, and I love seeing how she\u2019s sprouted and grown as a player,\u201d added Gibbons. \u201cShe has so much ahead of her. She\u2019s such an incredible player. She continues to take us far.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leading scorers on the night were Gibbons with 19 points, Scott with 16, Liz Cain with 12 and Hannah Best with 10.<\/p>\n

Members of the 2023-2024 Wachusett Regional High girls varsity MIAA Final Four basketball team are Rileigh Leary, Sophie Gibbons, Mary Gibbons, Liz Cain, Lil Chaisson, Jae Scott, Akosua Adu-Gyamfi, Caitlin Ciccone, Hannah Best, Teegan Lanpher and Olivia Reidy. Captains are Leary, Cain, Best and Mary Gibbons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By John Orrell Landmark Correspondent HOLDEN \u2014 The Wachusett Regional High girls\u2019 basketball team inched one step closer to its collective goal \u2014 a Division 1 state championship \u2014 with a 67-44 victory over No. 7 seed visitors Weymouth High on March 7, played before a jam-packed audience. The quarterfinal win earned the No. 2 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47448,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17,38,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-school-news","category-sports"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47445\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}