By Kyle WannenFor DigitalSports.com
After Linganore had cut their lead to four points, the Blake girls' basketball team needed a lift.
Junior guard
Christine Weithman drove past her defender, was fouled as she scored a layup and then made the ensuing free throw to boost the Bengals' lead and they held on for a 61-53 victory against the Lancers and advance to the state championship.
"I was just getting frustrated," Weithman said. "Shots weren't falling but I saw that drive and I wasn't really paying attention to how much we were up by. I just went in and I was so into the game."
The Bengals scored 25 first quarter points and then outscored the Lancers 12-0 through the first seven minutes of the second quarter. Weithman finished with 12 points but Blake's offense revolved around
senior guard
Danielle Douglas who scored a game-high 23, including 13
in the first half. Senior forward
Faye Dunston also chipped in 12 points.
"Basically we told our kids going into the game that we wanted to make it an uptempo game," Blake coach
Patti Gilmore said. "I thought [
Gabi]
Hall for us did a nice job of defending inside and the guards were out and running early on."
Fellow starters Hall and sophomore guard
Justine Allen scored eight and six points respectively as the Bengals got every point from their starting five players. In the state championship Gilmore expects more of an impact from her bench.
"In all of our close games, against Paint Branch, against Northwest Saturday, Gaithersburg last Thursday, we've gotten a lot of good minutes off the bench," Gilmore said.
Despite leading by 15 points heading into halftime the Bengals allowed Linganore to creep back into the game behind strong play from guards
Jessica Musselman and
Alison Eader who scored 14 and 11 points respectively. Forward
Corinne Glover also scored 12 points as the Lancers slowly cut the Bengals' lead to four points late in the fourth quarter.
"The same fight we've had all season," Musselman said about the key to the comeback. "We can always come back, never giving up. It's just the way we play."
"I think we got a little tired," Gilmore said. "We got in some foul trouble. I think the natural tendency is to relax some but we came back particularly the last two or three minutes we made some good plays."
With the win against Linganore, Blake advanced the the 4A State Championship where they will face powerhouse Eleanor Roosevelt who has won the title for the past four years. Roosevelt is also the team which has knocked the Bengals out of the playoffs in the past two years.
"We all just want to come out and beat them," Douglas said. "Lost to them the last two years. It gives us more motivation to come out and bet them. I think we are good enough to beat them."
"Last year we didn't expect to lose but I don't know what happened," Dunston said. "We just weren't focused when we started."