Girls basketball: Red Raiders rally in overtime

The Wauwatosa East girls blew a big lead Friday, but rallied to tie the game in the fourth quarter before blowing away Brookfield East for an overtime, 45-38 road victory.

The Red Raiders earned their fourth win of the season, tying their total win mark from 2010-11 with at least nine games left in the season (and one guaranteed playoff game).

The Red Raiders are now 3-5 in the Greater Metro Conference, sixth out of eight teams. They are 4-9 overall while Brookfield East is still winless in conference play (0-8) and 3-13 overall.

The Red Raiders were led by junior wing Katie Salmon with 16 points, while junior guard Alayah Walls had 11. Brookfield was led by freshman wing Kellie Goodman and junior forward Lauren Kennedy with 10 points each. Kennedy also grabbed 10 rebounds for her first career double-double.

Tosa East led 16-12 in a low-scoring first half, but then the Spartans went on a 15-2 tear in the third quarter to take a 27-18 lead into the final period. Fortunately, the Red Raiders tied the game in the fourth quarter with a 15-6 run and sent it into overtime tied at 33-33.

"At one point early in the fourth quarter it was 30-18 and not looking good," Tosa East coach Rob Hamill said. "But we finally turned up the pressure like we wanted on defense and made some things happen."

With the score 33-30 and just under 15 seconds to go in regulation Walls was at the line shooting two. She made the first, but missed the second (not on purpose), but Salmon was able to grab the rebound and put it back in to tie it at 33.

The Red Raiders defense then held and the game went into overtime.

Tosa then outscored the Spartans, 12-5, in the extra period to win the game, with senior wing Maddie Packard scoring six of her nine points.

"In overtime we were active and aggressive and got a bunch of opportunities at the free throw line," Hamill said. "Maddie Packard gave us huge free throws - all net - to squirt ahead for good."

The Red Raiders are now 2-5 in their last seven games while the Lady Spartans have now dropped 10 of 11 games overall.

"We are a little distressed over our uneven play," Hamill said. "We again start slowly but struggle to a four-point lead at half. Our third quarter was just about our worst quarter all season. But to our credit we showed resiliency. I was very happy that there was never any quit in our team."

Hamill was also happy with the way his team fought back.

"We didn't quit and got the win," he said.