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The Chisago Lakes girls’ basketball team suffered another conference defeat at home against St. Louis Park Tuesday, January 24. The contest was close the whole way, but the Orioles came away with a 52-49 win.

A 7-0 run in the final minute of the first half gave St. Louis Park a 24-21 halftime lead. A similar run to close the contest spelled defeat for the Wildcats.

The Orioles scored on their final four possessions while the ‘Cats struggled to ice the game with freethrows.

Chisago Lakes led by one with 20 seconds on the clock when Wildcat Junior center Jess Peterson stole the ball. A St. Louis Park player stole it right back and made a long pass ahead to Emily Hendricks, waiting under the basket. A foul denied her the easy layup but forced her to the freethrow line where she calmly knocked down both freethrows to give the Orioles the lead with eight seconds left. The ‘Cats weren’t able to convert on their final possession, giving the Orioles the win.

Wildcat head coach Carl Pierson observed, “This is a game that wasn’t lost in the final minute, it was lost at about a dozen junctures throughout the game when we got them to miss, but failed to box out and allowed them an easy putback. It was a difficult loss but there were a number of lessons learned on the evening and I’m confident we won’t make those same mistakes in the future.

“We obviously need to get more scoring from various positions and from our bench. When only five people score and two of those players combine for three points, it’s clear we need some people to elevate their play,” summarized Pierson.

Courtney Skoog had a career high 19 points to share scoring honors with Peterson. Kori Sells collected 10 rebounds and Megan Corradi dished out four assists.

Scoring Summary

Chisago Lakes 24 27 51

St. Louis Park 21 28 49

Courtney Skoog ............. 19

Megan Corradi ............. 8

Kori Sells ............. 1

Jess Peterson ............. 19

Alise Bowie ............. 2

Total 49

St. Francis 85, Chisago Lakes 46

Despite the lopsided score, the Wildcats played a much better game at St. Francis Friday, January 27 than they did when they hosted the Saints January 9.

St. Francis has been a good shooting team all season and it showed against the Wildcats. The Saints shot a blistering 16 for 30 in the first half despite the ‘Cats best efforts on defense.

Chisago attacked the Saints’ pressure defense and earned 15 trips to the freethrow line in the first half. According to coach Pierson, this statistic demonstrates aggressiveness with the basketball and marked a big improvement from the first meeting between the teams.

In the first meeting St. Francis got a number of easy, uncontested layups. On Friday, they had to settle for contested jump shots for much of the game. But, even with a hand in the face, they were still hitting a high percentage of their shots.

Pierson said, “Again, we have two players produce for us, but we have a hard time finding a consistent third or fourth. It’s not just going to happen by accident either. We’ve got to have a couple players really commit themselves to becoming better offensive threats in the offseason.

“Though the score would seem to indicate otherwise, we played 100 percent better against them this time. We contested every shot, making them really earn their points and we were very aggressive and attacked on offense.

“The bottom line is they were just quicker and more skilled at practically every position. Their program is a few years ahead of ours right now, but now we’ve got a good feel for where we need to be to compete for a conference championship.

“Our players battled for 36 minutes and never backed down. That means as much to me as anything,” Pierson concluded.

Scoring Summary

Chisago Lakes 22 24 46

St. Francis 48 37 85

Courtney Skoog ............. 2

Megan Corradi ............. 15

Kori Sells ............. 2

Jess Peterson ............. 13

Alise Bowie ............. 2

Kayla Schultz ............. 2

Mel Lewis ............. 2

Kristen Tengwall............. 2

Caitlin Cunningham........ 2

Amanda Farrell ............. 2

Alyssa Lundberg ............. 2

Total 46

Cambridge-Isanti 46, CL 37

The Wildcats and Bluejackets played an extremely physical game at Cambridge Saturday, January 28.

Wildcat coach Pierson described it as, “ the proverbial football game disguised as a basketball game.” Both teams found themselves in the bonus for 10 minutes of the first and second halves.

According to the coach, the ‘Jackets had more depth and they were able to take advantage when some of the top Wildcat players were out of the game.

Both teams had trouble scoring, as the 20-20 halftime score would indicate. Chisago Lakes shot only 25 percent from the field and Cambridge hit just 32 percent of its shots.

In addition to shooting, the two big keys to the game were turnovers and offensive rebounds. The Wildcats had 25 turnovers, compared to 17 by Cambridge, and the ‘Jackets capitalized on a good percentage of its 14 offensive rebounds.

Pierson described the game as, “Another disappointing loss. But, the positive that can be taken from it is how far we progressed in terms of our willingness to be physical. If this game would have been played in November, we would have lost by 25 because we wouldn’t have pushed and shoved back at them. We are making incremental strides. We’re taking two steps forward and one back. It’s not as rapid of progress as I would like, but it’s progress.

“We know we can count on Jess every game to put up numbers, but we’re still looking for that consistency from other players.”

Alise Bowie led the ‘Cats in rebounding with nine. Peterson had six caroms and Brenna Coyle collected four off the bench.

Scoring Summary

Chisago Lakes 20 17 37

Cambridge 20 26 46

Courtney Skoog ............. 5

Megan Corradi ............. 1

Jess Peterson ............. 13

Alise Bowie ............. 4

Kayla Schultz ............. 3

Mel Lewis ............. 2

Caitlin Cunningham........ 5

Brenna Coyle ............. 4

Total 46

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