CURWENSVILLE — It’s not usually expected that one of your main players in the post will be looked at in a key situation to knock down a 3-point shot with the game hanging in the balance, but that’s exactly what Curwensville sophomore Briah Peoples did Wednesday night at Patton Hall.
With less than a minute left in a tie ball game against West Branch, Peoples took a pass from Brooklynn Price and calmly drilled a three to give the Lady Tide a 40-37 lead. Senior Natalie Wischuck iced it with a pair of free throws after the Lady Warriors try from behind the arc was short, and Curwensville picked up a 42-37 victory,
“She loves that three, and she can shoot it,” Curwensville head coach Dawna Wheeler said. “She hits that three in practice. I know it’s (not expected) because she’s the big girl or whatever, but she can hit that three.”

Peoples’ trey was the completion of a rally by Curwensville, which held a 9-point lead early in the third quarter only to see that evaporate as the Lady Warriors went on a 17-1 run that lasted well into the fourth quarter.
But after falling behind 34-27, the Lady Tide finished the game on it own 15-3 run to rally for the win, their first of the season.
“We needed it,” Wheeler said. “Big confidence booster. I’m glad it happened now. We have 12 games left and we’re going to need a little confidence with these 12 games we have left.”
Both teams scored nine points in the first quarter — the Lady Warriors getting seven from Sarah Guglielmi, who led all players with 20 points, while Curwensville used a 13-3 advantage on the boards to get second-chance opportunities and convert enough to go to the second tied.
Curwensville ended up outrebounding the Lady Warriors by 15 in the game. The Lady Tide had 19 offensive rebounds, while limiting the visitors to just five.
“We’ve really been stressing rebounding, offensive and defensive,” Wheeler said. “We need to start out-rebounding our opponents and just do a better job of getting the ball. They answered tonight. In that first quarter when we threw up a bunch of shots and got our own rebound, we were padding our stats a bit.”
Curwensville took a 22-17 advantage to the half in large part due to a pair of 3s from Karleigh Freyer, who scored eight points in the quarter and tied Peoples for the team-lead with 15 for the game.
Peoples gave Curwensville its biggest lead of the game in the early moments of the second half with a pair of field goals to up the Lady Tide edge to 26-17.
But an old nemesis reared its head in the third quarter as the Lady Tide turned the ball over 10 times, doubling what they had in the entire first half. That, and the scoring prowess of Guglielmi, who netted six in the third, got West Branch back in the game.
The Lady Warriors closed the gap to 27-25 by the end of the third before scoring the first nine points of the fourth. Nola Briscoe had five of those points, burying a 3-pointer during the run, as the visitors took advantage of more Lady Tide turnovers as well as forced shots and rushed possessions by Curwensville as it pressed to stop the West Branch run.
Peoples and Price hit baskets to help Curwensville close to 34-33 after Wheeler called a timeout to get her troops back on the same page.
“Just took a couple timeouts and talked to them to get them calmed down and told them to relax.” Wheeler said. “Possession was the key, we needed possession. And they listened. They did what we needed to do to get the win. They were able to settle themselves down and each other down and take care of the basketball.”
Curwensville also caught a bit of a break as it cut the deficit down to one with Lady Warrior Lily Williams fouling out with 2:14 left to play. Williams had four points, three assists, three steals and seven rebounds in the game.
Freyer tied the game at 35-35 with a field goal from just inside the arc, then tied it again at 37 apiece following a Lady Warrior bucket.

That set the stage for the Peoples trey that put Curwensville on top for good.
Freyer paced all players on the glass with 14 rebounds, while Price pulled down 10 and Peoples and Addison Warren each grabbed six.
Guglielmi notched seven boards for the Lady Warriors with Nola Briscoe adding six.
Curwensville improved to 1-10, while West Branch dipped to 0-14.
The Lady Tide travel to Glendale Thursday night.
West Branch—37
Nola Briscoe 4 0-2 9, Isabella Kerfoot 1 0-0 2, Irelyn Briscoe 0 0-2 0, Lily Williams 2 0-2 4, Sarah Guglielmi 9 2-2 20, Leyton Williams 1 0-0 2. Totals: 17 2-8 37.
Curwensville—42
Briah Peoples 4 6-8 15, Addison Warren 0 3-4 3, Brooklynn Price 2 0-1 4, Karleigh Freyer 5 3-7 15, Natalie Wischuck 1 3-4 5, Jayda Gaul 0 0-0 0, Kylah Wos 0 0-0 0, Jovee Elensky 0 0-0 0. Totals: 12 15-24 42.
Three-pointers: West Branch 1 (N. Briscoe); Curwensville 3 (Freyer 2, Peoples).
Score by Quarters
West Branch 9 8 8 12—37
Curwensville 9 13 5 15—42
LADY TIDE SCOREBOARD:
Date Opponent Score Record
12/02 @ Purchase Line 29 – 63 0 – 1
12/06 WILLIAMSBURG 19 – 97 0 – 2
12/09 JOHNSONBURG 38 – 40 0 – 3
12/12 JUNIATA VALLEY 22 – 63 0 – 4
12/17 CLAYSBURG-KIMMEL 38 – 49 0 – 5
12/19 GLENDALE 32 – 58 0 – 6
12/23 PURCHASE LINE 28 – 59 0 – 7
01/06 WEST BRANCH ppd. 0 – 7
01/09 @ Moshannon Valley 33 – 45 0 – 8
01/14 @ Williamsburg 32 – 99 0 – 9
01/20 @ Juniata Valley 21 – 68 0 – 10
01/22 WEST BRANCH 42 – 37 1 – 10
01/23 @ Glendale
01/27 KANE
01/28 @ Keystone
01/30 @ West Branch
02/03 MOSHANNON VALLEY
02/05 @ Mt. Union
02/06 CRANBERRY
02/10 UNION
02/11 @ Bucktail
02/13 @ Clearfield