SYRACUSE –– The Cortland girls basketball team could not find enough offense Wednesday, falling to Christian Brothers Academy 40-31 on the road.
The Purple Tigers’ offensive issues have been a theme all season, being held under 40 points in eight of 10 games. Despite that, Cortland head coach Janice Meyer is still happy with the progression her team is continuing to make on that end of the floor.
“A lot of these things can’t be fixed overnight in the season,” Meyer said. “We play a lot of basketball, but we’ve had some big players that have left our program and there is a lot of new kids in new roles and they’re embracing it and making improvements everyday.”
Cortland trailed by five at the half, but the game got away from it in the third. After a Gabby Brown layup cut the margin to six, CBA went on an 8-0 burst that put the Purple Tigers in a hole they couldn’t escape. Lilah Kirch started the run with a short jumper, followed by a Maya White-Dudhani putback. Kirch drilled another mid-range jumper and a pair of Cara Macaluso free throws stretched CBA’s lead to 14.
Lily Yang and Katie Harris connected on 3-pointers to end the third strong and cut the deficit to 10.
Cortland made its last push to start the fourth and put itself in a position to rally all the way back. Nora Gambitta provided a spark in the frame, with two straight layups sandwiching a Liana Thomas bucket. After Macaluso knocked down a free throw to extend the lead back to nine, Gambitta drilled a pair at the line, making the CBA lead seven. Cortland made four trips down the floor trailing by seven, but couldn’t find the bottom of the net with two missed 3-pointers, three missed layups and a turnover. That eventually allowed CBA to slam the door shut with a Thomas putback all but sealing it late.
Meyer was happy with the way Cortland battled to the final horn.
“We’re making improvements every game, this is just a super tough matchup for us,” Meyer said. “CBA came back a much different team this year, very solid and full of athletes. I think we did a really good job battling. I think some small fundamental differences, some ball strength things and some panic moments, are still a little part of us, but we’ve cleaned up a lot of it. I think we get better from that game right there if we can translate it next week to games that are really within our realm to secure.”
Yang and Brown finished as the high scorers for Cortland with seven each. Gambitta tallied all six of her points in the fourth, Aubree Larkin, Zee-Anna Sweat and Harris all scored three and Kartyr Hubbard had two.
Cortland will look to get back on track at 12:30 p.m. Saturday, when it visits New Hartford.
