By. Zach Harnischfeger
PAVILION, NY.--- It was a cold and snowy Wednesday night as the Pavilion Golden Gophers girls' basketball team hosted the Byron-Bergen Bees. The Bees were able to pull off a 43-36 win in a back-and-forth affair.
"Overall, I was pleased," Byron-Bergen head coach Rick Krewinski said. "I thought we started a little slow, but then we went on a nice run. The last two, three minutes of the second quarter we had a lead. We didn't play well in the third quarter, but then we had another nice little jump where we opened it back up to 10. We had spurts where I wasn't really happy, but then we opened up the lead and were able to hold onto it."
The first quarter was sloppy by both teams as they exchanged fouls, turnovers, and missed shots. Pavilion forward Lia Lambardo got the scoring started three minutes into the contest and the Golden Gophers finished the quarter leading 10-7.
The Bees picked it up in the second quarter with strong defense and the offense was led by guard Janessa Amesbury who scored 13 of her game-best 21 points.
"We play as a team," Amesbury said. "We try to work together and go to the basket as much as we can to try and draw fouls and that's how I get my points going to the basket. We just try to stay together as a team and not get upset at each other."
Amesbury led the team with 18 points per game last season and the senior guard put up 27 points in the Bees 56-37 win over Albion on Monday.
The second quarter ended with the Bees up 24-15. Both teams struggled to get much going offensively in the third quarter as a combined 13 points were scored. The score after three quarters was 28-24 Byron-Bergen. Kylie Conway led the way for Pavilion scoring four of the team's nine points in the quarter.
The Bees went on an eight-point run to begin the fourth quarter and used that to propel them to the victory.
For the Golden Gophers, Conway finished the night with 12 points, which led the team. Forward Ella Tillotson finished the night second on the team in points with 10.
"We were a little hesitant at the start," Conway said. "I think we eventually got our mojo down and we started to work together and talk more. Our big key of the year is to talk more and I think we did a good job at the end doing that and coming together. It definitely was a close game and a good team effort.
With the win the Bees improve to 2-0 on the season and will travel to take on Perry on Saturday afternoon at 2:30 p.m. The Golden Gophers drop to 0-1 on the season and will host Keshequa on Friday night at 7 p.m.
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