Skippers chop 'Oakers' down in home win
By Erin Brennan

Jess Brown squares up for a free throw in the Skippers game against St. Mary's Bay View Academy. Brown, a freshman, swings between the JV and varsity teams. Photo by Caitlin Downing

This past Monday, the North Kingstown Girls JV Basketball team faced the Coventry Oakers in one of the last league games of the season. The JV team has one of the strongest records, 12-3, in the league and the state. The girls began the playoffs in a tournament on Sunday with a disheartening loss to LaSalle Academy, but their performance on Monday can only help to motivate them for the rest of the games this season.

Monday's game started off slow, with island freshman Jess Brown starting in center and tipping the ball back to the Skippers, but the team promptly lost the ball to the Oakers, who swiftly scored, despite a good defensive effort.

The Skippers quickly regained the points within the first two minutes, and the score stayed at 2-2 until 10:30 left on the clock, when Jackie Decristiforo sank a shot from the left. The game stayed at a slow pace, but sophomore islander Allison Smith made several good rebound attempts that just missed the net. Both the Skippers and the Oakers made many attempts to net the ball, but were unsuccessful in shooting efforts.

Smith was offered the chance to raise the Skipper lead with 7:15 left on the clock when she was fouled and granted two free-throws. Unfortunately, neither made the basket, but eventually the score was raised as both the Skippers and Oakers finally found the net at the end of the first half.

After several fumbles with the ball, and even a few tumbles on the floor, Brown also began to get into a rhythm, as she scored with 1:50 left on the clock, and had assists on several more Skipper shots. The first half ended with the low Skipper lead of 10-8.

Although the first half was a bit sloppy in way of Skipper offense, the second half started with much more momentum. Island sophomore Eloise Heath entered the game, and the Skippers moved the ball faster and more efficiently, raising the score to 18-10 in the first four minutes of the second half.

But perhaps the strangest part of the game came with 3:54 left on the clock. Smith was about to shoot a free-throw when lights started flashing, alarms started buzzing, and the fire alarms started whooping. Everyone filed out of the gymnasium into the frigid air. The cause was burnt popcorn. Smith got back on the free-throw line when the game resumed, unfortunately, she couldn't seem to find the hoop. Later Smith contributed to more movement in the second half. The Skippers ended the night with a win 21-14 over the Oakers.

"I'm happy we won, but we played poorly," said Smith. "But we did win, which is a good thing."

The win against Coventry was a morale booster as the team lost to LaSalle in the previous night's playoff game. "Losing to La- Salle was hard," said Heath. "We had beaten them before, so it was a little disappointing this time around."

Both Smith and Heath played on the freshmen basketball team last year, and have been adjusting to playing junior varsity. "The game is a lot different in JV," said Smith, "The ball moves a lot faster, which takes some getting used to."

"It's a lot more competitive this year," Heath chimed in.

But both Heath and Smith feel that the team is working well together. "We have a lot of good teamwork, and we've been getting better," said Heath.

Jess Brown, who also swung to the varsity game later in the evening, is also adding to the Skippers depth. With these three strong players, the North Kingstown basketball future looks to be in good hands.