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# John Stark girls basketball continues run, beats Bishop Brady to reach D2 title game
- URL: https://www.nh-highschoolsports.com/john-stark-girls-basketball-continues-run-beats-bishop-brady-to-reach-d2-title-game/
- Published: 2018-03-07T16:26:55.000Z
- Updated: 2018-03-07T16:26:55.000Z
- Description: MANCHESTER - Emily Patten never felt the John Stark High School girls basketball was ever in trouble during Tuesday night's Division II semifinal. Not when Bishop Brady went on a 12-3 run in the fourth quarter to turn an 11-point Generals' lead to two. Not when John Stark missed the front end of tw
- Author: Joe Marchilena
- Tags: Division II, Bishop Brady, girls basketball, John Stark, playoffs, slider, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-08-18 04:44

MANCHESTER - Emily Patten never felt the John Stark High School girls basketball was ever in trouble during Tuesday night's Division II semifinal.

Not when Bishop Brady went on a 12-3 run in the fourth quarter to turn an 11-point Generals' lead to two. Not when John Stark missed the front end of two one-and-ones early in the quarter. And not when the Giants had a chance to force overtime in the final seconds.

The John Stark senior had reason to be confident - her team had done this kind of thing twice before.

For the third straight playoff game, the No. 13 Generals scratched and clawed their way past a team seeded higher, as John Stark advanced to the D2 title game with a 47-44 victory over No. 8 Bishop Brady at Southern New Hampshire University. The Generals advanced to a final for the first time since 2003, and will try for their first title since 1991 at 7 p.m. Friday against No. 3 Hollis Brookline.

"We had nothing to lose," Patten said. "I was confident the whole time. I was a little nervous they might go on a run, but I never thought they’d take it from us. I knew we’ve done it before in the past two rounds."

After going on the road to knock off No. 4 Pelham and No. 5 Kennett, the Generals came in knowing they'd need to play better to beat Bishop Brady. When the teams played on Feb. 21, the Giants closed the first half of a close game with a run and dominated the second half on the way to a 23-point win.

"We got demoralized after that (end to the first half)," John Stark coach Bruce Johnson said. "We had a horrible third quarter. We watched the film and said we didn’t play that well. We came out and controlled the game. (The Generals) deserve a ton of credit. They’ve worked hard to get here."

Arianna Maxwell came off the bench to lead John Stark (12-9) with 12 points, as she was 7 of 11 from the free throw line, while Chelsea Woodsum and Jillian Douzanis each had eight points and Autumn Nelson added six points and 11 rebounds.

The Generals held a slight edge on the boards (43-42) and held the Giants to 24.6 percent shooting from the field, including 4 of 31 from behind the 3-point line.

Sarah Doherty scored nine of her 16 points in the fourth quarter for Bishop Brady (14-7) and Sam Will had 12 points, 15 rebounds and six blocks, but no one else had more than five points for a team that had averaged 63.5 points in its last eight games, including the playoffs.

"We had to pay attention to Sam Will," John Stark senior Laura Martin said. "We payed special attention to her, but we had to watch their drives and their kickouts, and we definitely had a lot of help defense."

Woodsum, a sophomore, spent most of the night guarding Will.

"We weren’t going to make adjustments, but we had other things that we would have done if we needed to," Johnson said. "We address that we didn’t want (Will) to get her perfect position, make her work for her position that she may not be used to all the time."

Bishop Brady never led and the game was tied once, 3-3, after a 3-pointer by Doherty midway through the first quarter. The Generals ended the quarter on a 10-3 after that to lead 13-6 going into the second and John Stark was up 23-17 at halftime. The Generals controlled the third quarter, as well, outscoring the Giants 14-9 to take an 11-point lead into the fourth quarter, but Bishop Brady wasn't done.

Doherty scored six straight points to open the quarter and cut the lead to five, as John Stark went scoreless for more than three minutes, missing a couple of one-and-ones early. To that point, the Generals had gone just 7 of 18 from the line, but Maxwell hit the second of two to give John Stark a 38-32 lead.

After the teams traded a pair of free throws, Lauren Roy hit back-to-back jumpers for the Giants to get them within two points, 40-38, with 2:57 remaining. Nelson hit two free throws for the Generals, and after Will hit one of two at the line, Martin added two more to give John Stark a 44-39 lead with 33 seconds left.

Kaylee Smith missed a 3 at the other end, but got her own rebound and found Doherty for a 3 that cut the lead to two points again with 19 seconds left. The Giants fouled with 11 seconds to go, and Martin made one of two free throws to give the Generals a 45-42 lead.

Bishop Brady quickly got down the court and Smith got an open 3 from the corner, but missed the mark. Will grabbed the rebound and laid it in to make it a one-point game with four seconds left and the Giants called a timeout with 1.3 left on the clock.

On the inbounds play, John Stark set up to pass the ball from one player to another out of bounds, but the clock operator started the clock before the ball was put in play and the buzzer sounded.

Officials put one second back on the clock and Bishop Brady fouled Woodsum with three-tenths of a second left. The sophomore made both free throws and Doherty's desperation heavy was well short.