BANGOR – This Dirigo girls’ basketball team, like a decade’s worth of sensational squads before it, expects to play suffocating defense. Expects to run the floor with the abandon of kindergarten kids at 2 p.m. on a Friday. Expects to win.
Expected to capture the school’s sixth Class C championship since 1995 by swishing 3-pointers more frequently than transition lay-ups? Uh, no.
Wait a minute. No’ isn’t sufficient admonition. That suggestion deserves something more like, are you crazy?
“It usually isn’t a big part of our offense,” senior Alexa Kaubris said of that forgotten weapon in the Dirigo arsenal, the turn-and-fire from 20 feet and beyond.
The Cougars could have fooled Dexter, and the rest of us, after connecting for a Class C championship game record six 3-pointers in their thrilling, 44-42 win Friday night at Bangor Auditorium.
Dirigo owned the previous record of five, set here six years ago in a loss to Calais.
Brooke Weston’s flurry of four treys also trumped the title-game standard, shared by Rebecca Fletcher and Michele Gagnon of (surprise, surprise) Dirigo.
Fletcher, now a Cougars assistant coach, nailed three trifectas in the 1996 final. Gagnon scored her hat trick in 2001.
Those teams and players had a knack for the bonus ball. Everyone’s accustomed to seeing this group gut it out with fast-break deuces and free throws.
Silly that we’d underestimate any aspect of Dirigo’s game at this stage, though, isn’t it?
“Everyone on our team can shoot,” Kaubris said. “Everyone on our team has played so much basketball. Sometimes you can’t always tell that on the floor, but there’s so many of us out there.”
If there’s a gunner in the gang, it’s Weston.
The point guard knew that any chance of a Dirigo victory against Dexter and its substantial frontcourt hinged on her ability to cash in an open look or two.
Or four.
“You can’t drive all the time against them,” Weston said, paying homage to sisters Mallory and Ashley Ames, who are 6-foot-6 and 6-4, respectively. “Coach (Gavin Kane) just said, If you’re open, shoot it, but shoot it with confidence.'”
Weston’s a guard. But what’s with forward Michelle Holmquist and center Holly Knight taking aim from beyond the arc?
Dexter coach Jody Grant is still wondering.
“It surprised us quite a bit, to be honest. But they’re well coached,” Grant said. “They hit some shots in the second half that they haven’t hit a lot this season.”
Kane gave Holmquist and Knight the green light, something they haven’t seen since, well, since preseason, probably.
“Our big girls will shoot it occasionally. We started letting them shoot it a little more early in the year, then became a little bit more disciplined with our offense down the stretch,” Kane said. “Both of ’em are capable of knocking one down for us.”
Weston hit one in each quarter.
Her confidence was never lacking, even if the rest of us forgot about the Cougars’ ability to dial long distance.
“I just put it up said, OK, it’s going in, now what am I going to do on defense after it goes in?'” Weston said.
There’s that expecting to win thing, again.
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