Gardiner's Not a 4-Point Play

Well, we did it. Games are all final. The scores are all in. The Heal Points are set (assuming I didn't type a score in wrong). And I got a little bit of sleep.

Let's wrap up the regular season.

I thought about going to the Gardiner/Medomak game, but I'd seen both teams several times, the Lincoln/Winslow game looked interesting, and it meant I could update the Heal Points on the final day an hour earlier, which I thought people would appreciate.

Luckily, Jeff Miles was there.

Love this.

And when this notification popped up, it seemed like I had made a good decision.

I did not make a good decision.

Gardiner used a 10-0 run to come roaring back from down 14 with 6 minutes left.

Then down 3 with 23 seconds left, this happened, which I've grabbed from Munzing Media's YouTube stream (with permission, of course). Jump to about 2:21:00 on YouTube if you want to watch the full sequence.

This is a great angle by the Munzing Media crew (who did their usual stellar job) of Trace Moody having the presence of mind to throw up an absolute prayer and actually making it. The only problem is the officials apparently didn't get a good look at his feet. You can see on the clip the trail official, who doesn't have a great angle of the feet, makes the call and the official to the side appears to be blocked by 2 defenders. Moody also lands nearly at the block, so he's nowhere near the 3-point line at the end of the play. You can see how they could think the shot was a 2. If you watch it at full speed on the main broadcast angle it's a tough call to get right.

Only, they didn't get it right. It should have been a 3. Moody made the free throw to tie the game and Medomak answered with a Kollin Donlin bucket to retake the lead and escape with a 59-56 win. Donlin finished with 20 & 10. Gardiner has a real gripe here because that's a huge call, but it doesn't materially change how either team is going to approach the next possession--down 1 or tied Medomak needs to score either way and Gardiner needs to get a stop. It's not exactly the same, but it's not like they should have been up 3 instead of 2 with 18 seconds left and then the decisions are different.

As Rob Munzing said on the broadcast, this will get you ready for the tournament. And I think that's really what you're looking for here. If you're Gardiner, you dug deep and rallied down big against a contender and nearly stole a win. If you're Medomak, you survived a furious rally from a contender and pulled out a win on the road. Neither team needed the win, really. You've gotta love a pressure test in your final game.

The Medomak win put them within range of York for the 1 seed in B South and they could get there with help from their good friends from Lincoln Academy, who was hosting Winslow on Senior Night. Lincoln Academy was in, according to the Tourney Odds and Winslow needed to win to get in and get some help.

It was a close game throughout. I don't think it was ever more than a 2-possession game.

We had the ultra-rare technical for too many players on the court.

And Chase Ober's nice blocked shot was waived off for a traveling call.

This should be a stat--blocked shots that don't count. You should get it for plays like this and plays where your teammate commits a shooting foul and you get the helpside rejection. If you think about it, in that case the basket would count if you didn't block the shot.

During the game, several Lincoln Academy fans asked me if they were still in if they lost or if they needed help, which confused me because in the Tourney Odds, they had been in for at least a couple days, but enough people asked that I started to second guess it, so during timeouts I was looking at the Heal Points and doing quick math on my phone calculator. The worry was that Morse could pass them with a win and, in theory they could, but Lincoln would stay ahead with the help points they'd get from beating Morse twice. Heal Points!

Jack Flaherty hit a 3 to give Winslow the lead for good with 45 seconds left.

Winslow hit their free throws in the final minute and won 58-52 to knock Lisbon out of the post-season. They'll head to Dirigo for a 7/10 prelim. With the loss, Lincoln Academy fell to 10 and will play Oceanside in a prelim. They also kept Medomak from the 1 seed.

Erskine's Gavin Fanjoy's steal and dunk in overtime was the game winner over Lawrence...and then the students stormed the court.

In the Game of the Day, the Cheverus girls built a 14-point lead, then let it slip away, but Cheverus held on, helped by these 2 free throws by Addie Jordon.

Cheverus grabs the 1 seed. South Portland dropped to 3rd after Sanford beat Biddeford.

Michael Hoffer was there.

Cheverus girls return to form, edge South Portland in thrilling regular season finale

SOUTH PORTLAND—What a difference 48 hours made for Cheverus’ girls’ basketball team. The Stags, who suffered their first loss of the season, in decisive fashion, Tuesday at Biddeford, regrouped in practice Wednesday, then Thursday evening, put their new-and-improved show on the court at Beal Gymnasium in the regular season

Hoffer's High School SportsMichael Hoffer

Nolan Ames closed out the regular season in style with not one, but two buzzer beaters. I highly recommend watching these, because one of them is unreal.

Ames finished with 29 points, 8 rebounds, and 7 steals in Camden's win over Brewer. They'll be the 1 seed in A North.

Speaking of buzzer-beaters, E.J. Herrick hit one with style.

Herrick finished with 21 in Scarborough's win.

Elsewhere

Maddie Provost went off for 30 & 11 as Lawrence beat Erskine and grabbed the 3 seed. Ashley Shores added 22 & 12...Tyrie James dropped 31 and Colin Janvrin chipped in 16 & 10 and Windham beat TA to clinch the 1 and the program's first ever SMAA title...Colin Schlobohm's 24 wasn't enough for Leavitt to survive Cony's fourth quarter surge. Jackson Kay led the Rams with 20...Dylan Gendron's 15 led Sanford over Biddeford...Lucas LeGage had 15 in Portland's win over Deering...Gio Staples had 14 to lead Westbrook's balanced attack over Massabesic...Cooper Abell hit 5 3's in Mount Blue's win over Oxford Hills...Dylan Myhal had 16 in Kennebunk's win over Marshwood...Kylie Cole had 19 as Bonny Eagle doubled up Falmouth...Edward Little got 17 from Elizabeth Galway as they beat Lewiston...Reese Darling's 19 led Morse over Waterville...Lawino Bendasta scored 15 in Portland's come-from-behind win over Deering...Dirigo's Abby Luczynski dropped 21 on Mountain Valley...Lily Bellerose went off for 32 in Spruce's blowout of Lisbon...Mollie Puffer went off for 29 as Sanford beat Biddeford to grab the 2 seed...Zoe Dellinger had 15 in Gorham's win over Scarborough...EL's Akol Maiwen scored 19 in a win over Lewiston...

Gold Ball Odds are up! Let's take our first look at the ultra-competitive B North girls.

As usual, there's more information if you hover/click.

The S Quarterfinal schedules are set. So, we've known the schedules for the other classes for a couple weeks. For example: we've known that the A South Boys 1 seed will play at 6:45pm at the Expo. But the S schedule has been a mystery. And now we know it.

Augusta

Bangor

I have no actual information about this, but it's hard to not notice that schools are playing their boys and girls games in back-to-back slots in almost every situation. That has to be intentional. And I think it's fascinating. I don't think the MPA would have done this 10 years ago. I've long said we should tweak the schedule to avoid situations where the boys team plays the Friday late game and the girls team plays in the first Saturday morning slot or have the last game in the block be the teams that are the closest to the tournament site. Because, you know, driving.

You can listen to the Maine Calling radio episode I did with Bill Green, Peter Murray, and special guest Andy Bedard(!) on your favorite podcast platform.

Cooper doing Cooper things.

If you missed it, Mike Vrabel won the NFL Coach of the Year award.

Up next: I'm cleaning up the Media Guide. It should be up sometime this weekend, assuming I don't run into any issues (knock on wood). Here's a reminder of what last year's looked like

Rest up!