In front of a large crowd of students, teachers, parents and siblings, the Oak Bluffs girls and West Tisbury boys basketball teams reigned supreme in this year’s middle school championship played at the regional high school.
The Oak Bluffs Blazers faced the West Tisbury Hawks in the girls championship and capped a 10-win undefeated season with a 33-21 triumph.
Led by coaches Becca Goreham and Kat DeBettencourt, the journey of this group of Blazers began with the current eighth-grade class going winless as sixth-graders in their first season. Fast forward two seasons later and the Blazers are a force to be reckoned with.
“They’re just a really good group,” Ms. DeBettencourt said. “We have some good leaders and they all worked together this season and proved to us that even the quietest players could speak up and take the lead.”
Ms. DeBettencourt said there was a huge difference over the years in watching how the team grew up. “They had no idea what they were doing and then this year they were coming up with plays and understanding things much easier,” she said. “Our eighth graders set the tone for everything. They took the younger ones and accepted them so well and I think that was important.”
Ali Dyke led the Blazers in scoring with 12 points. Paige Malowski also contributed 10 points for Oak Bluffs while West Tisbury’s Claire Mone lead all scorers with 13 points.
Before the girls championship, the boys teams from West Tisbury and Tisbury took the court for their championship game. Having split their season series, the championship shaped up to be a good one. Tisbury had reached the finals after narrowly escaping a tough semifinal game against the Oak Bluffs School. The West Tisbury Hawks advanced after defeating the Edgartown Eagles last Wednesday in the battle of the birds.
West Tisbury held an advantage over Tisbury in height and in hair length, but a speedy Tisbury team played them closely. Trading three-point buckets and fighting for rebounds, the Hawks pulled away in the third period and fended off the Tigers in the final quarter to hold on to a 56-42 victory.
West Tisbury’s Nate Story led the Hawks in scoring with 23 points; his teammate Parker Bradlee contributed 15 points. Josh Lake led the Tigers in scoring with 20 points. The win capped a 9-1 season for West Tisbury.
“We’ve got a good inside-outside game, we have some height and some good skill players on the perimeter, so we try to be balanced and go from there,” said West Tisbury coach Matt Gebo. “It’s a fun league, keeps everybody busy in the winter.”
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