Pinkerton girls basketball pulls away from Londonderry in second half

DERRY – A close first half contest quickly turned into a one-sided contest Friday night, as the Pinkerton Academy girls basketball team defeated Londonderry 58-39.

This rivalry matchup was important for both schools, as Pinkerton head coach Lani Buskey stated, “This might be the closest thing we have to a playoff atmosphere all year.”

On the other side Londonderry’s Nick Theos talked about how big and large of an atmosphere this is for his girls, especially with his team playing a lot of 15-year-olds pretending they are 17.

Pinkerton (8-1) began the game in a full court press, leading to an extremely fast first quarter pace with a score of 17-16 after one. Led by sophomore standout Brooke Kane, who accumulated several blocks and rebounds and was the anchor on the press, forcing many turnovers.

“The full court press is to get our legs going, but there is no way we could keep it up the entire game, especially at home with this crowd,” Buskey said.

After a much slower second quarter pace the Astros led at halftime 26-21. The five-point halftime lead was close due to the Astros struggles from the foul line, where Pinkerton went 4 for 12. To keep pace Londonderry (6-4) stayed alive through the 3-point shooting of sophomore Emily Dumaresq, who paced the Lancers with nine first-half points, all from behind the arc.

Pinkerton’s first half foul shot troubles were alleviated when Kane stepped up on offense in the third quarter contributing 11 points in the frame. Her size became overwhelming to Londonderry while the Lancers had to still respect her outside touch.

“With Brooke being six-foot tall, this is one game where we definitely have a size advantage,” Buskey said.

Londonderry was not able to seize the momentum after the quarter breaks. The Lancers started each of the last three quarters without scoring a field goal for at least the first four minutes.

“We knew they were long, but we had trouble stopping them and getting rebounds leading to our fast break where a lot of points come from,” Theos said.

Kane led the game throughout with a double-double, scoring 22 point while adding 12 rebounds and eight blocks. Her teammate and senior captain Amanda Lemire added 18 points.