Harmon’s heroics lift Burrillville
Guard has three steals, 3 points in last minute
BURRILLVILLE — For nearly 31 minutes of Monday night’s Division III quarterfinal contest with No. 5 Toll Gate, Burrillville guard Alicia Harmon’s contribution was just three points – all from the foul line.
But, with the No. 4 Broncos’ trailing by a point late in the contest after once holding a 10-point advantage, Harmon made a number of crucial plays to keep her team’s season alive. Harmon gave the Broncos a lead they would never relinquish when she grabbed an offensive rebound and hit two free throws with just 1:08 left.
Harmon’s contributions didn’t stop there. She produced a pair of steals in the ensuing 30 seconds and knocked down another free throw to stretch the lead to two. Another steal late in the game led directly to an Alyssa Simpson score to help the Broncos earn a 43-38 victory at the Broncodome.
“Those plays were just huge and that’s exactly what we need from her,” Burrillville coach Sam Stanton said. “She’s just great at having tunnel vision and just thinking ‘I’m in a game’ and blocking everything else out. She’s really come a long way and made big plays for us.”
“At the end of the game we had a lot of support from the fans and us seniors knew this was going to be our last home game,” forward Karianna Roman said after producing 13 points. “We don’t like losing and we don’t like losing in our own dome. We just wanted to take it.”
Burrillville, which will play either No. 1 Tolman or No. 8 North Smithfield in the semifinals Thursday night at 5:30 at Johnston High, found an interesting way to win a playoff game. For most of the first half the only Bronco who could score was Simpson, who scored her team’s first seven points and finished with a game-high 15 points.
Late in the first half, with the Broncos trailing by two points, Roman scored her team’s next 10 points to help Burrillville build a 10-point advantage with just 9:58 left in the regulation. Eventually, however, Burrillville’s one-woman offensive approach caught up to them.
“We need each other a lot and on any night it can be anybody’s night,” Stanton said of her team’s offensive approach. “There’s an advantage and a disadvantage to that. We don’t have that one superstar, but we need each other and we need to function that way. That’s been our biggest challenge all year. We knew it going into the season and the girls have stepped and taken on the challenge.”
Toll Gate, which defeated the Broncos during the regular season, was in deep trouble with 5:59 left and Roman at the foul line. After the senior made a free throw to put the Broncos up 3224, nature came to the Titans’ aid. At 7:11 Burrillville High School experi- enced a power outage that lasted 13 minutes.
Following the outage, Roman missed the ensuing free throw and the Titans went to work against Burrillville’s 1-3-1 zone. Senior forward Isabel Donnelly was moved to the foul line, where she was given space to either shoot the ball or make a high-low pass to a forward. The move worked, ass Toll Gate went on a 13-4 run to take a 37-36 lead after a Sam Arnold 3-pointer.
“We were a little shocked, so it was nice to get a little no-light break,” Toll Gate coach Owen Paquet said. “We just talked about desire and we needed to fire them up. Isabel has been making unbelievable decisions with the basketball in the middle of the paint. She’s the backbone of our offense.”
The Titans struggled to get Donnelly the ball much early in the first half, as the Broncos’ full-court pressure created turnovers and easy buckets for Simpson, who scored the game’s first five points. The Titans responded with a 13-4 thanks to Arnold and Natelie Aloiso, but then Roman took over.
After scoring the half’s final four points to give Burrillville a two-point lead, the senior scored her team’s first six points of the second half. The Broncos led by 10 after a pair of Simpson free throws.
Aloisio (team-high 12 points), Donnelly (nine points) and Arnold led the Titans on a late 6-0 run following the 13-minute break to take the lead, but that simply set the state for Harmon to become the Broncos’ hero.
“That break hurt us because we had the momentum and when we started again we needed to get back on our roll,” Stanton said. “The crowd was great tonight and they stuck with us and never gave up on us. No, I’ve never seen a situation like this in my life. I was just thinking ‘Of course it would happen here in a playoff game.’ I’m just thankful we were able to continue.”