Langhorne, PA - The Cairn women's basketball team kept it close with the four-time defending CSAC Champion Cabrini Cavaliers on Wednesday night, before the Cavaliers ran away from the Highlanders late in the fourth quarter. Heading into the fourth-quarter the Highlanders trailed by just six points, but that deficit ballooned to 18 points by the end of the final stanza.
Aigner Bookard led the Highlanders with 16 points in the contest. Five other Highlanders went for at least six points in the contest.
The opening of the contest began as a back-and-forth battle between the Highlanders and Cavaliers. The Highlanders took an early lead with a bucket off the tip from Bookard. Cabrini countered with a three from Erin Dodds on the very next possession. Just a few minutes later the Cavaliers grew their lead to three points with an and-one play by Dodds. That three-point play made it 8-5 just 2:31 into the contest.
Over the next four-plus minutes the only bucket for either side was a transition layup by Cabrini's Nomi Washington to make it 10-5. Cairn then put together with three-straight scores to take a 12-10 lead after layups by
Victoria Stum and
Payton Emerick and then a three from EJ Hartlzer. Cabrini ended the quarter on a 5-2 run to take a 15-14 lead at the end of one.
Midway through the second, Hartzler connected on another three to tie the score at 21-21. With 5:35 remaining in the second-quarter it would be the last time that the Highlanders had a share of the lead. Cabrini hit two shots from downtown for their next two scores, but the Highlanders countered with a pair of layups to keep the contest close. A layup by Myonie Williamson beat the buzzer and gave Cabrini a four-point edge heading into the half at 30-26.
After a
Charlotte Camp layup early in the second-half the deficit remained at four. The Cavaliers quickly pushed this lead to 11 with a 7-0 run in the span of a minute. Cairn chopped this lead down to five points at 43-38 with buckets from Bookard,
Madelyn Brodish, and Camp. Cairn kept it close over the final five minutes of the quarter and trailed by just six heading to the fourth-quarter.
The first eight minutes of the final quarter felt much like the first 30 minutes. The Highlanders were hanging around and trailed by just eight, 63-55 with 2:24 remaining in regulation. Over the final two-plus minutes is when the Cavaliers put the pedal to the metal. Cabrini scored the game's final 10 points in the last two minutes and defeated Cairn by a 73-55 final.
The Highlanders will next take the floor on Saturday, when they host Keystone College in the Mason Activity Center at 1:00 p.m.
