NORTH ROBINSON — As Wynford junior point guard Grace Stucky stepped to the free-throw line, she hadn’t played much in the second half due to foul trouble.
The situation couldn’t have been more pressure packed. The Royals and Colonel Crawford were tied at 41-41 with just 3.1 seconds left in the game and Stucky had two shots.
She missed the first one, but coach Amy Taylor-Sheldon still had confidence in her point guard.
“I think we know which players have to step up and make the plays when it counts,” Taylor-Sheldon said. “The kids know who they are, too.
“With the game on the line, those are the players we want to put in that position,” Taylor-Sheldon added. “Grace is one of those players. I’m so proud of her.”
Stucky calmly stepped to the line and dropped the second free throw, giving the Royals a tough 42-41 win over the Eagles in a critical Northern 10 Athletic Conference game.
With the win, the Royals improved to 4-1 in the N10, 6-2 overall, and stayed one game back of league-leading Buckeye Central. Colonel Crawford fell to 1-4 in the conference, 4-5 overall.
But Crawford came storming back after Wynford’s Averi McMillan scored eight straight points in the third period to take a 32-22 lead.
From that point on, the Eagles outscored the Royals, 19-9, to tie the game at 41-41 with 44.8 seconds left in the game on a pair of free throws from Kaylyn Risner.
Crawford also did a nice job pressuring the Royals in the fourth period, holding Wynford to just one field goal in the final eight minutes.
“We just fought, we kept fighting,” Colonel Crawford coach Kyle Fenner said. “We could have quit there but we didn’t, we kept on fighting. Kaylyn is a fighter, and she just brings the kids with her. I can’t fault our effort tonight.
“We battled, but we just have to go back to the drawing board and keep battling,” she added.
Wynford did a nice job pushing the ball inside to their post players McMillan, Katie Wagner, and Alexis Stevely. McMillan led all scorers with 21 points, as the posts scored 31 of the team’s 42 points.
“We wanted to take advantage of our players inside,” Taylor-Sheldon said. “Averi is a strong player, and she did a nice job of taking the ball to the basket. We also did a good job of feeding the ball into the post.
“They put pressure on our perimeter players. So, we had some options down low.”
After Wynford grabbed that 32-22 lead with 1:30 left in the third period, Crawford got a basket from Mallory Plesac and a huge 3-point shot from Allison Weithman to cut the lead to 32-27. But Wynford countered with a Stevely 3 to take a 35-27 lead going into the fourth period.
Plesac completed a three-point play to open the final frame, then hit two free throws. Risner drained a 3, cutting the Wynford lead to 37-35 with 5:47 left.
After Wynford’s Paige Smith scored, Risner hit two free throws and Plesac added two free throws to tie the game at 39-39 with 3:50 left.
Crawford was nine-for-nine from the line in the fourth period and 16-for-20 for the game.
Fenner said she was happy with her team’s defensive effort, especially in the second half.
“We made a couple of mistakes here and there, but I thought they hurt us in the first half trying to pressure them and they hurt us long and got some easy baskets,” Fenner said. “We can’t allow them to have baskets that way.”
Plesac paced the Eagles with 13 and Risner added 12. Emma Valentine dropped eight for Crawford.
“Emma made some big shots for us in the first half,” Fenner said. “She is a tough kid.”
“We did a good job on Kaylyn, we held her to half her average,” Taylor-Sheldon said. “We had to be able to do that if we wanted to win.”
Stucky backed McMillan with seven points for the Royals and Stevely added six.
“McMillan is really good, and she hurt us in spots,” Fenner said. “We struggled to guard her. There were rebounds that we didn’t get that hurt us, we have to be more physical and get them.”
Colonel Crawford won the junior varsity game, 39-10. Freshman Mira Holt led the Eagles with 18 and Ayla McKibben added 11. Kenna Caldwell scored six points for Wynford.
Box score
Wynford 10 10 15 7 — 42
Colonel Crawford 7 10 10 14 — 41
Wynford (6-2, 4-1 N10): Shots 15-38; 3-pt. shots 1-9 (Alexis Stevely); Free throws 11-20; Rebounds 31; Turnovers 20. Scoring: Maddie Coffman 1 0 2, Grace Stucky 3 1 7, Paige Smith 1 0 2, Averi McMillan 8 5 21, Alexis Stevely 1 3 6, Katie Wagner 1 2 4.
Colonel Crawford (4-5. 1-4 N10): Shots 11-42; 3-pt. shots 3-15 (Emma Valentine, Allison Weithman, Kaylyn Risner); Free throws 16-20; Rebounds 32; Turnovers 18. Scoring: Emma Valentine 3 1 8, Mallory Plesac 3 7 13, Allison Weithman 2 0 5, Corin Feik 1 1 3, Kaylyn Risner 2 7 12.
JV: Colonel Crawford 39-10.