LYNN — Behind a hard-nosed defensive effort and a couple of timely baskets late in the game, the Lynn Tech girls basketball team outlasted KIPP Academy and took home a 42-38 victory at home Friday evening.
“Our defense is what got us over the edge in this game,” said Tech coach Kaitlyn Wechsler. “We know that half-court offense is in our strength, so we needed to play to our strengths, which are defense and hustle.”
Tech was led on the offensive side by Jayleen Novas, who notched 18 points and seven rebounds in the win. Dayana Hios-Edwards wasn’t far behind, putting up a double-double with 14 points and 12 rebounds. Nyari Lane-Benjamin (six points, five rebounds) and Amie Diaz (two points, five rebounds) also played well in the victory.
For KIPP, Tatiana Megie-Maddrey led the way with 18 points and five rebounds. Jaiska Delacruz added eight points and six rebounds, while Chidalu Aniekwenagbu (six points, three rebounds) and Genesis Evbenaye (four points, five rebounds) also played well.
While both offenses took a little while to get going, Tech was able to jump ahead early and take a six-point lead. But KIPP battled right back, eventually tying the game up at 15-15 early in the second quarter. But behind strong play from Novas and Lane-Benjamin, the Tigers took a 25-21 lead into the halftime break.
Tech stretched that lead to its largest of the game midway through the third quarter, going up by eight points.
But as the fourth quarter started, KIPP battled back once again. With most of the points coming from Megie-Maddrey, the Panthers crawled all the way back into the game and only trailed by three points with two minutes to play.
That is when the Tech defense made its big push, picking up a number of key steals in the final two minutes to hold on to the lead and eventually walk away with the win.
KIPP (0-2) is off until Thursday (1:30) when it hosts Salem Academy.
Tech (2-0) plays on the road at Whittier Tuesday evening (5:30).
“We’re going to get right back in the gym (Friday) and work on our shooting because we haven’t had a ton of time to work on that yet,” said Wechsler. “After that, we’ll hit the court Monday to work on defense and then come out ready for another tough test on Tuesday.”
