Cloquet Girls Win Overtime Thriller

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Jan 19, 2012

Wes Vork-NSO

The Cloquet girls basketball game won a thriller against Duluth Denfeld on Thursday night when the Jacks outscored the Hunters 8-7 in overtime to leave with the 59-58 road win.

Avery Bieri led the Cloquet attack with seven first half points and Amy Campbell had a put-back at the buzzer to help the Jacks to a 25-22 first half lead.

Cloquet was able to open things up a bit in the second half and built a 40-33 lead with ten minutes left in regulation. A pesky Denfeld squad would not go away though and chipped at the Jacks lead, cutting it to two points at 51-49. Then with :28 seconds remaining in the half, Rebecca Hendrickson was fouled and hit both free throws to tie the game for the eighth time and force overtime at 51-51.

Bieri got the Jacks on the board first in the overtime session and the Jacks traded baskets with the Jacks to add three more ties to the eight in the regular session for 11 total ties in the back-and forth-game. With Cloquet up 59-57, the Hunters were fouled and hit the first of two free throws but missed the second and the Jacks held on for the one point win.

For the game the Lady Jacks shot only 39%, but ratcheted things up and shot 4-5 for 80% in the overtime session to secure the win.

Bieri led the Jacks with 17 points on the night and made her presence known on the boards with 11 rebounds. Joining them in double figures were Courtney Thompson and Krista Schmitz with 12 points each; Schmitz also shot 50%, hitting 4-8 from beyond the arc while Thompson pulled down 9 rebounds. Four players, Amy Campbell, Morgan Jensen, Tara Longseth, and Kenzie Rathe all finished with 4 points and Reilly Kedrowski rounded out the Cloquet scoring with two points. Carri Zeadow did not score but made a huge contribution, leading all players with 8 assists.

Denfeld was led by Leah Hamm with 19 points.

Cloquet will be back in action on Saturday when they travel to Crosby-Ironton for a 3:30pm matinee game.

Wes Vork can be reached at wes@northlandsportsonline.com