CURWENSVILLE — An extraordinary first-half performance by Christine Limbert under the boards and a 26-point outburst by Ciara Strickland fueled the Curwensville girls basketball team’s 51-28 win over backyard rival Clearfield in their regular season finale at Patton Hall Friday night.
Limbert had a double-double by intermission with all 10 of her points on putbacks and layups and 15 of her 20 rebounds as the Lady Tide, with Strickland contributing 14 points, built a 24-14 advantage en route to their sixth victory in a row.
“The big thing about Christine is she comes out and doesn’t worry about anything but getting her job done,” Curwensville coach Rusty McCracken said. “She is just determined. She had 268 rebounds coming in.
“I can’t be more proud of a sophomore coming in and dominating the way she has most of the season.”
Clearfield coach Joey Castagnolo also praised Limbert’s effort.
“She‘s so improved,” he said. “She worked hard on the boards. My hat’s off to her.
“And with an inside threat like that, along with the two girls that can shoot outside, that’s pretty nice for that class, double-A.”
Hannah Dixon is the other Lady Tide scoring threat and also had 10 points, most of them coming after the Lady Bison rallied early in the third period.
After Strickland opened the second half with the third of her six three-pointers and cashed a Heather Thorp assist, Clearfield got a putback by Rachel Glenny, a bucket by Emily Ryan and two free throws by Mary Ishman to make it 29-20.
McCracken was thankful for a timeout called by Castagnolo at that point.
“That gave me a chance to get the girls in a relaxed mode,” he explained. “We were kind of getting anxious, and we just kind of settled down, saw the shots that were open later on and put ’em in the basket in that little stretch.
“It was just a matter of us taking control back. We had to play our game and not worry about what they were doing.”
Four points by Dixon and a trey from Strickland in the right corner expanded the Lady Tide lead to 36-20 when the Lady Bison couldn’t muster any more points in the final 4:21 of the quarter.
“I think we hit the wall there, fatigue,” admitted Castagnolo, whose team was playing its fourth game in as many nights and had two starters playing at less than 100 percent. “I was trying to rotate to keep kids fresh, because I thought maybe in the fourth quarter that rest would help them, but it never really materialized because they kept that cushion.
“Couple mental breakdowns, couple passes and before you know it you’re down 15. It’s hard to come back because we don’t have the firepower that teams we played all year did. We don’t have the outside shot.”
Dixon and Strickland duplicated their third-quarter finish with the same sequence to start the fourth period, pushing Curwensville’s bulge to 43-22 with 6:23 to go.
In the final Patton Hall appearance of her outstanding career, Strickland later added two free throws and another three-pointer to cap her 14th game with 20 or more points.
“We lost track of Strickland a few times,” Castagnolo said. “If you do that, she buries it.”
“I hate to take her for granted, because we would not be anywhere without Ciara Strickland out there,” McCracken said.” We expect Ciara to do well.
“Then, on the other side of that is my other senior, Thorp, who has probably 250 (career) assists right now. A big share of those points Ciara has been able to score have come off the hard effort of Heather finding her and giving her the ball.”
Thorp had a typical game as the Lady Tide distributor with seven assists.
McCracken tried to downplay the rivalry angle to his team and, instead, have them concentrate on continuing their late-season run to the District 9 Class AA Playoffs that begin next week.
“We just wanted to win, go out and try to play hard and keep everybody healthy and finish the job,” he said. “We were hoping it would put us in a better position in the playoffs.
The Lady Tide, whose seed and opponent will be announced this weekend, will carry a 16-6 record into the postseason.
“It was one more win than we had last year, which always is a positive thing.”
Ryan was the high scorer for Clearfield with 11 points.
The Lady Bison ended a disappointing season with 10-game losing streak for a 4-18 record.
Playing their final game were Emily Aveni, Mary Ishman, Janessa Riddell and Tess Waring. Maggie Sopic, the other senior, played only five games before being sidelined by an injury.
The junior varsity game was all Clearfield, 52-1, with Sam Rockmore and Ally Lindstrom scoring 16 and 14 points, respectively.
CLEARFIELD —28
Emily Aveni 2 0-0 4, Emily Ryan 4 3-4 11, Rachel Glenny 1 3-4 5, Margo Castagnolo 3 0-0 6, Janessa Riddell 0 0-0 0, Mary Ishman 0 2-6 2, Ally Lindstrom 0 0-2 2, Sam Rockmore 0 0-0 0, Tess Waring 0 0-0 0, Brooke Cline 0 0-0 0, Chesney Boal 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 10 8-16 28.
CURWENSVILLE — 51
Heather Thorp 0 1-2 1, Hannah Dixon 4 2-2 10, Christine Limbert 5 0-1 10, Ciara Strickland 8 4-6 26, Shauna Guy 2 0-2 4, Kayli Sedgwick 0 0-0 0, Dominique Newkirk 0 0-0 0, Camryn Richards 0 0-0 0, Kristina McCracken 0 0-0 0, Nikki Wormuth 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 19 7-13 51.
Three-Point Field Goals – Curwensville 6 (Strickland 6).
Score by Quarters
Clearfield 8 6 6 8 – 28
Curwensville 17 7 12 15 – 51
Officials – Chuck Pasternak, Barry Abbott and Jerry Carnicella.
Final Lady Bison Scoreboard:
| Date | Opponent | Score | Record |
| 12/05 | @ Brookville Tip-off Tourney | ||
| 12/05 | vs. Northern Clarion | 25 – 43 | 0 – 1 |
| 12/06 | vs. Clarion-Limestone | 63 – 40 | 1 – 1 |
| 12/10 | @ Central | 38 – 57 | 1 – 2 |
| 12/12 | HUNTINGDON | 25 – 37 | 1 – 3 |
| 12/15 | PUNXSUTAWNEY | 43 – 57 | 1 – 4 |
| 12/16 | BELLEFONTE | 49-47 2ot | 2 – 4 |
| 12/19 | @ Tyrone | 45 – 73 | 2 – 5 |
| 12/22 | @ Brookville | 31 – 70 | 2 – 6 |
| 12/29 | CURWENSVILLE | 40 – 66 | 2 – 7 |
| 01/05 | @ Punxsutawney | 34 – 63 | 2 – 8 |
| 01/07 | BALD EAGLE AREA | 45 – 31 | 3 – 8 |
| 01/09 | @ Penns Valley | ppd. | 3 – 8 |
| 01/13 | PHILIPSBURG-OSCEOLA | 70 – 64 | 4 – 8 |
| 01/16 | ST. MARYS | 44 – 45 | 4 – 9 |
| 01/21 | CENTRAL | ppd. | 4 – 9 |
| 01/23 | @ Huntingdon | 31 – 56 | 4 – 10 |
| 01/26 | @ Bellefonte | ppd. | 4 – 10 |
| 01/28 | @ Penns Valley | 25 – 45 | 4 – 11 |
| 01/30 | TYRONE | 34 – 58 | 4 – 12 |
| 02/02 | CENTRAL | ppd. | 4 – 12 |
| 02/04 | @ Bald Eagle Area | 33 – 40 | 4 – 13 |
| 02/06 | PENNS VALLEY | 25 – 56 | 4 – 14 |
| 02/10 | @ Philipsburg-Osceola | 47 – 66 | 4 – 15 |
| 02/11 | CENTRAL | 39 – 61 | 4 – 16 |
| 02/12 | @ Bellefonte | 26 – 33 | 4 – 17 |
| 02/13 | @ Curwensville | 28 – 51 | 4 – 18 |
Lady Tide Scoreboard:
| Date | Opponent | Score | Record |
| 12/08 | MO VALLEY | 61 – 45 | 1 – 0 |
| 12/09 | BROCKWAY | 67 – 46 | 2 – 0 |
| 12/12 | @ Ridgway | 42 – 36 | 3 – 0 |
| 12/19 | @ Kane | 46 – 51 | 3 – 1 |
| 12/29 | @ Clearfield | 66 – 40 | 4 – 1 |
| 01/02 | DUBOIS CENTRAL | 30 – 40 | 4 – 2 |
| 01/05 | WEST BRANCH | 58 – 37 | 5 – 2 |
| 01/06 | @ Johnsonburg | 60 – 47 | 6 – 2 |
| 01/08 | HARMONY | ppd. | 6 – 2 |
| 01/13 | @ Elk County Catholic | 25 – 52 | 6 – 3 |
| 01/15 | @ Mo Valley | 50 – 30 | 7 – 3 |
| 01/20 | RIDGWAY | 48 – 49 | 7 – 4 |
| 01/22 | HARMONY | 47 – 38 | 8 – 4 |
| 01/23 | @ Brockway | 47 – 40 | 9 – 4 |
| 01/26 | @ DuBois Central | ppd. | 9 – 4 |
| 01/27 | @ DuBois Central | 33 – 60 | 9 – 5 |
| 01/28 | GLENDALE | 50 – 33 | 10 – 5 |
| 01/30 | JOHNSONBURG | 38 – 51 | 10 – 6 |
| 02/03 | @ Sheffield | 63 – 36 | 11 – 6 |
| 02/04 | @ Glendale | 55 – 43 | 12 – 6 |
| 02/06 | KANE | 55 – 35 | 13 – 6 |
| 02/09 | @ Harmony | 46 – 40 | 14 – 6 |
| 02/11 | @ West Branch | 51 – 44 | 15 – 6 |
| 02/13 | CLEARFIELD | 51 – 28 | 16 – 6 |
| TBD | District 9 AA Playoffs |