The undefeated Conant Orioles marched on to the semifinals with Saturday night’s NHIAA Division III playoff win over Gilford, but the mood in the Pratt was far from celebratory. Sure, the Orioles got the 55-22 win they needed, but they suffered a major loss, too, as senior captain Regan Despres was carried off the court with what appeared to be a serious knee injury just minutes into the game.
“We’re all just feeling a little down for [Regan],” senior Mylie Aho (16 points) said after the game. “She’s a big part of our team. I know how much this matters to her. This was her last game ever playing here. So we’ve all got to pick it up for her.”
With the Pratt pin-drop silent and the Orioles visibly shaken, No. 8 Gilford looked for a moment like they could actually make a run at the No. 1 Orioles; Ryan Guyer scored seven points in the first half for the Eagles as Conant turned to Isabella Hart, Bella Hayes and Kendall Chamberlain to fill in for Despres.
From Julianna Estremera and Belmont in 2019 to physical Campbell in 2020 and then the random-draw road trip to Hopkinton in last year’s COVID schedule, the Orioles have never had it easy in the quarterfinals.
“These quarterfinal games, we anticipate a little bit of sloppiness,” head coach Brian Troy said. “It’s been a week and two days since we played. So we’ve just got to refocus.”
It didn’t take long for the Orioles to find their groove again. Whenever Conant needs some quick offense, they can’t do much better than Division III’s leading scorer, junior center Emma Tenters, who sparked a second-quarter Oriole run along with senior Teagan Kirby and then poured in 10 second-half points on her way to a game-high 18.
“We just know that we’re a third-quarter team,” Aho said. “We know that we’re a second-half team…We were like ‘Okay, it’s time to pick it up.’ And we did just that.”
It was the final game in the Pratt Auditorium for Despres, Kirby, Hayes, Chamberlain and Aho, Conant’s five-senior crew who’ve been playing together since elementary school and now possess a girls’ program record 57-game winning streak.
“They really have been special,” Troy said. “They’ve been such a core foundation of all the success we’ve had here – they’ve been awesome. I speak volumes of every single one of them, and it’s sad that this is their last game at the Pratt, but I’m glad we can at least continue the season for them a little bit, and hopefully go out with a bang with them too, the way we should go out and the way we want to go out.”
Conant (19-0) will play No. 4 Newfound in the DIII semifinals Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at Bedford. The Bears survived No. 5 Kearsarge 26-25 in the quarters and look like the type of team that matches up well with Conant (if such a thing exists). Senior forward Paulina Huckins is as strong as they come in DIII and senior guard Malina Bohlmann is playing at an All-State level, so the Orioles will have to be well-prepared come Wednesday night.
On the other side of the bracket, back-to-back runner-up No. 2 Fall Mountain snuck by No. 7 Stevens 44-41 and will play No. 6 Monadnock in the semis. Fall Mountain’s only loss this season is to Conant; the Wildcats beat the Huskies once in the regular season, and Monadnock came closer than anybody to beating Conant this year, losing 43-42.
If winning a third straight Division III championship wasn’t enough motivation, the Orioles are now playing for their injured senior captain, who appears likely to miss the remainder of the season.
“It’s going to fuel us a lot,” Aho said. “We want to do it for her. We’re doing it for the whole team, but now that she’s hurt, it’s her senior year – we just want to win it all for her.”