Hanson girls' comeback comes up short

The Beavers were within striking distance but top-ranked St. Thomas More’s composure sealed the 48-39 victory at the Hanson Classic Saturday at the Corn Palace.

The Hanson girls’ basketball team scored seven straight points on baskets from Kynedi Cheeseman and Leah Marsh to bring itself within one of the defending Class A state champions with 3:29 left in the game.

From that point, the Cavaliers controlled the ball, closing out the game on an 8-0 run.

“We gave up a couple of easy ones that they were able to feed off of,” St. Thomas More coach Brandon Kandolin said. “We needed to make sure that we got back and not give up those easy baskets. I was very proud that we were able to withstand a couple of runs that they made.”

Hanson head coach Jim Bridge said his team beat itself with missed opportunities.

“We just made too many mistakes and we paid for it, said Bridge, whose team had 15 turnovers to the Cavaliers’ 10 in the game. “They take advantage of when you make mistakes. I don’t think they really did too much to us but it was what we were doing to ourselves.”

The Beavers had more possessions than their opponent, outrebounding the Cavaliers 34-27.

Like the final minutes of the game, the majority was run-filled. To open the game, the Cavaliers got out to a 14-5 lead within the first five minutes.

In the second quarter, the Beavers put together a string of baskets for eight straight points, all by Cheeseman, to go ahead 24-22 with 1:51 left on the clock. This was Hanson’s first lead of the game since the opening basket.

St. Thomas More, which shot 36 percent from the field, went on a run of its own with a 3-pointer from Alexys Swedlund, who had 15 first-half points, and a last second layup to take the 27-24 lead, one it wouldn’t give up.

The Cavaliers were able to stretch its lead to as many as eight before Hanson went on its run to lessen the deficit to 40-39.

Late points by Swedlund, who led all players with 21 points with three 3-pointers, Elizabeth Carreiro and Madison Kirsch helped St. Thomas More improve to a percent 10-0 on the season.

Although the Beavers, who shot 37 percent from the field, suffered their first loss of the season, senior forward Lindsi Dey said the team can take positives from the game.

“We’re going to learn from this loss,” she said. “We were up on them, and we can key in on that and take that as a positive for ourselves.”

Bridge agreed.

“The experience that we gained playing in this big game was big,” said Bridge, whose team fell to 10-1. “I really believe this will really be a good building block for us.”

Hanson attempts to rebound from the loss as it hosts Howard today in Alexandria.

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