HANOVER — The Hanover High girls basketball team and its sharpshooter were firing on all cylinders in a home playoff game with Lebanon on Sunday.
Paced by Stella Galanes’ career-high-tying 26 points, the Marauders cruised past the Raiders, 48-32, in the NHIAA Division II quarterfinal matchup.
“Stella came to play tonight, which was nice,” said Hanover coach Dan O’Rourke, whose team, with Sunday’s win, beat its archrival three times this winter.
The Marauders (15-0) will face Kennett in the semifinals on Thursday at Bedford High School. Game time is 7 p.m.
Sunday’s contest was all Hanover from the get-go, with the hosts jumping out to an 11-6 lead before holding Lebanon (9-4) to a single field goal in the second quarter. It was 26-8 by halftime.
“Lebanon is a very strong defensive team,” O’Rourke said. “It’s always more difficult when we play Lebanon to get into a flow. We’re a transition team, and they were able to sort of contain us.
“But I thought, in the end of the first quarter and then into the second quarter, we got into that flow, and once we get in that flow, our confidence starts going up. And, as you saw, our defensive intensity goes up, and it really gave us the separation we needed.”
Lebanon’s first-year coach, Emily Kehoe, spoke to her team’s sputtering second quarter against the undefeated Marauders.
“In general, I think that they are a more offensive-minded team, and they can score a lot easier than we can,” Kehoe said. “I think it’s hard when you can’t score right off; you don’t get to go into a rhythm, and I think offensively we really struggled tonight. And then us trying to force a little bit too much on offense allowed them to get easy baskets on defense.”
Hanover pushed its lead up to 20 points on a Melissa Whitmore drive to the basket to open the fourth quarter. Whitmore finished with nine points for the Marauders.
Sally Rainey led the Raiders with 12 points, followed by Catherine Cole with seven.
Lebanon’s lone senior, Rainey, was pulled from the contest late to receive a standing ovation from both sides of the crowd.
“That’s the only kid that the program’s going to lose, and that’s a big kid to lose,” Kehoe said. “Losing that one is like losing five kids. You think about (Rainey) and you think about, like, what you could have done for her and how we’re going to bounce back.”
The future looks bright, however, for Kehoe’s bunch.
“We have four starters coming back next year,” she said. “A really young team, a really young program, and so, I mean, you’ve got to just be positive and be happy about that. You have a whole lot that a lot of kids already know.”
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Notes: Lebanon lost four of its final five games. … Galanes also scored 26 in points Hanover’s 55-29 win over Stevens on Feb. 11. … The two teams met in last year’s D-II semifinals, with Lebanon advancing to a title game that was never played due to COVID-19. The Raiders were named co-champions with Spaulding. … The Marauders last won a state crown by defeating Kennett in 2019. … In his 20th year, O’Rourke is the Upper Valley’s longest-tenured girls basketball coach.