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Sports

Lower Merion Girls Advance In States

The Aces survived a sluggish start to derail Liberty.

It wasn’t exactly the kind of start the Lower Merion girls’ basketball team envisioned for Friday night, in the opening round of the PIAA Class AAAA state playoffs against Liberty, the third-place team from District 11.

It took about a half, but once the Lady Aces’ missing game they had been searching for the last two weeks resurfaced, it translated into a 38-24 victory over Liberty. The Lady Aces improved to 23-5 with the win, while Liberty’s season ended at 14-13.

Lower Merion will now advance to the second round and play the winner of Red Lion-Downingtown West on Tuesday at a site and time to be determined. In the meantime, the Aces got a chance to bask in a state playoff victory, thanks to a game-high 14 points from Jessie Porter and 11 points from Sheba Hall, all scored in the second half.

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Liberty took an 8-6 lead after one quarter and trailed by a slim 13-10 margin at halftime, with Hall and Lila Jones strapped to the bench in foul trouble.

“I think we actually started playing our game, despite me and Lila getting into foul trouble with the reaching fouls, when the second half began,” Hall said. “We had to contain them, and I think we did a better job of that. I knew we had to step up. We knew we should have had a bigger lead.”

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Hall and Porter each scored eight points in the third quarter as the Lady Aces surged ahead, 29-18, after three quarters (a serious side note: Aces’ 6-foot-3 sophomore Carmen Torres went down hard in the fourth quarter and injured her right ankle. She was taken to the hospital and could be questionable for Tuesday’s second-round game).

“We weren’t satisfied until the second half,” Aces’ senior Carli Swartz said. “I think we had a lot of redemption to go through from the last two games. Sheba and Lila were out with fouls and that forced Jesse out of position and I had to handle the ball. We were out of groove a little bit in the first half. We got it back in the second half.”

The third quarter was the key. The Aces sat back in a zone, fearful more foul trouble would put Hall and Jones back on the bench.

“We had to play hard and work off each other, because this game was huge for us,” Porter said. “The way we were playing coming into this game, this had to be a good game. We had to come out strong. The third quarter was really big for us. Our defense was really good and we knew we had to pick it up. We made some shots and moved the ball. But a big key was getting Sheba back on the court again. She had a great run and so many steals. She got us back up again.”

Hall finished with eight steals and four assists. She also was struck with a greater sense of urgency.

“I didn’t want my senior year to end; I didn’t want to lose,” Hall said. “There is a certain amount of life-and-death going on here. We want to put our name out there and this being my senior year. I want us to move as far as we can. I think we got our confidence back. This game was good for us. It shows when we play together, we can be successful.”

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