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By Joseph Staszewski
Brooklyn Daily
Missing her first two free throws bothered South Shore star forward Brianna Fraser, and inspired her to sink her last four when it counted.
“That really got to me,” Fraser said of her early misses.
In the final 20 seconds of last Friday’s game, the University of Maryland commit, who scored 14 points overall, calmly went to the line and connected on all four after South Shore had struggled from the charity stripe all game.
Fraser’s points helped secure the Vikings a 57–53 home victory over the 15-time defending city champions Murry Bergtraum in Public School Athletic League Class AA girl’s basketball. The game was a rematch of last season’s title game.
“That’s a clutch player right there,” said Vikings junior guard Amanda Cruz.
South Shore (6–5, 5–1) went up 51–46 after a steal and a layup by Cruz with 1:34 to play in the game. Bergtraum (12–2, 10–1) responded and pulled within 51–50 when Alexandra Smith banked in a jumper off a missed free throw by Milicia Reid (11 points) with 27 seconds left. Fraser made two free throws after being fouled on the inbounds play and emphatically rebounded a Joella Gibson miss.
“I knew that if I didn’t get the rebound they would have had a second chance,” Fraser said. “I just want the game to be over and get a W.”
She then made two more free throws to push the lead to five. Bergtraum’s Ashanae McLaughlin, who poured in a game-high 31 points, hit a deep three-pointer with 1.5 seconds left to make it 55-53.
The victory is the Viking’s third-straight win over the Lady Blazers during the regular season, but they have fallen in three title game meetings the last five years. Cruz thinks handing Bergtraum its first league loss is big, but she and her teammates cannot get ahead of themselves.
“It should build our confidence, but we should not get too hyped,” Cruz said. “We have to stay focused.”
South Shore never got frazzled, despite struggling at the free throw line. The Vikings led 28–27 at the half and trailed just 39–38 after three quarters. Bergtraum eventually had to come out of a box-and-1 defense on Fraser when guard Emmeri Archer (eight points) made two three-pointers to keep them honest, and foul trouble became a factor. Lady Blazers senior guard Joella Gibson scored just five points in limited action and Bergtraum had three freshmen on the floor at one point.
“When we looked at the tape of them we thought it was a two-man show so not a having the other one of the two men helped us,” Viking coach Anwar Gladden said of making Gibson a nonfactor.
His team has plenty of work ahead of it, but the goal is to make consecutive title game appearances for the first time in school history — and win this time. Beating Bergtraum in the regular season is important, but that doesn’t remove last season’s disappointment.
“We want to go back to back so the pain from the previous year is still fresh in our minds,” Gladden said.