AUBURN — Kory Norcross was glad that she had two shots.

With only a couple ticks of the clock left, the freshman Edward Little  guard went to the free-throw line with two chances to win the game. She only needed one.  Her first shot clanked on the back of the rim before tantalizingly rolling the right way and into the hoop.

“Once I made it, I felt a lot of relief,” said Norcross. “I don’t know how it went in.”

She missed her second attempt, but it didn’t matter. That one shot held up for a 39-38 win over Oxford Hills.

With playoff berths likely to be tough to come by for some KVAC teams in Eastern A, it was an important win for a young EL squad.

“When you look at Oxford Hills’ schedule, they’re going to win 10 or 12 or 13 games,” said EL coach Craig Jipson. “There’s a lot of winnable games for them. They’re going to be worth a ton of Heal Points at the end of the year.”

EL (3-0)  rallied from an eight-point deficit in the third quarter and used a strong fourth quarter to take control of the game. The Vikings (1-4) rallied late to tie it, but after an EL miss in the closing seconds, Norcross got the offensive rebound and was fouled with just two seconds left.

“It was big for Kory to come up with that,” said  Jipson. “I was so happy for her going in to get that offensive rebound. That was huge.”

Norcross finished with nine points but was a little anxious going to the line with the game at stake.

“I wasn’t shooting great the whole game,” said Norcross. “I was kind of nervous. I didn’t want to miss it. I just tried to stay calm and shoot like I do in practice.”

Ashlee Arnold led EL with 14. Oxford Hills got 15 from Crissy Lewis, who returned to EL where she played for the Red Eddies last year. Ashley West added 12.

The Vikings opened a close game by using Lewis inside and West from the perimeter. A West 3-pointer made it 27-19 with 4:40 left in the third.

Jipson tried to rally the troops and begged them for more energy. The Red Eddies responded with a strong finish and were within two points twice late in the third.

“During halftime, we said that we’re better than this,” said Norcross. “We were just playing scared and didn’t want to lose to one of our biggest rivals.”

Arnold hit a jumper and Marykate Masters scored all six of her points in the third to help rally EL. The Vikings were up by four after three, but the Red Eddies quickly tied the game early in the fourth. After a jumper by Arnold, Miranda Martin hit a shot from the corner.  Kate Sawyer followed with a jumper for the lead.

“Miranda Martin hitting the shot in the corner was huge,” said Jipson. “Marykate Masters was absolutely huge. What she gave us off the bench was great. Emily Hartnett had some nice passes. Our bench kids were able to come in and add something.”

EL had the lead up to 38-33 after free throws by Arnold, but the Vikings began to rally. Oxford Hills had just six shots from the floor and were plagued by turnovers with 10 in the fourth and 31 overall.

“You can only hold off good shooters for so long,” said Oxford Hills coach Nate Pelletier. “They have a couple of good shooters, and the were able to get shots off in the fourth quarter and they were making them.”

West hit her fourth 3-pointer with 1:27 left to make it 38-36. Then Lewis scored inside off an Abbie Eastman pass with 13 seconds left to tie it. That was after EL missed a chance to pad the lead at the free-throw line with 15 seconds left.

“That’s been our Achilles heel  this year,” said  Pelletier. “We didn’t have bad opportunities. We just haven’t finished well. We did down the stretch tonight. We made a comeback and did everything we wanted to do. We just had a miscue on a rebound. The girl got a rebound and a putback. It’s like last year when we played them and won on a foul shot.”

kmills@sunjournal.com

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