ORILLIA LAKERS BASKETBALL
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This past weekend the Orillia Lakers junior girls travelled to London and came away with a silver medal in their division of the Gold Medal Tournament.
In their first game, the Lakers were up against Transway from Hamilton, who were ranked eighth in the province coming in. The 19th ranked Orillia team played great and came away with a 57-50 upset to start the tournament.
The relentless defence and up-tempo offence of all 10 players frustrated and tired out the Transway team, who only used seven of their 11 players in the game. Leading all scorers in the game from Orillia was Hennessy Langner with 22 points. Other scorers were Emma Thomson (11 points), Lauryn Buchan (6 points) and Mya Erskine and Ashley Schryer, Zoe Peeters, who each contributed four points. Kaitlyn Roberts and Lauren Murphy had two points apiece.
Next up for the U19 Women were the 10th ranked team London CYO Lynx. With ten of the girls being first-year juniors, inconsistent play this season has been detrimental to the team, and the main contributor in the 51-30 loss. Scoring for Orillia were Hennessy Langner (11 points), Emma Thomson (6 points), Lauren Murphy and Lauryn Buchan (4 points each), Mya Erskine (3 points) and Ashley Schryer (2 points).
In their third game against the Smith Falls Storms, the young Lakers fell behind early and were not able to recover from a 23-12 first-quarter deficit. Although they fought hard the rest of the way, the game still ended in 58-52 loss. Emma Thomson led the scoring with 18 points. Other point-getters were Hennessy Langner (13 points), Ashley Schryer (8 points), Mya Erskine (5 points) and Lauren Murphy and Zoe Peeters with four points each.
With a silver medal now on the line with a win, the Lakers were up against the South Muskoka Breakers and came away with a 58-41 victory. The Breakers came out fast and built up an early 12-3 lead. Orillia then picked up their relentless defence and were able to catch up and lead by half 33-29. Keeping up the pressure on defence the Lakers were able to frustrate and pull away from the Breakers to the victory and silver medal.
Hennessy Langner led the way with 19 points, followed by Ashley Schryer (11 points), Zoe Peeters (8 points), Mya Erskine (7 points), Emma Thomson (6 point), Lauren Murphy (4 points) and Taylor Betchold-Coon (3 points)
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