Novajasky gets her 1,000th point, but Farmington falls
SOUTHINGTON — Farmington senior Emma Novajasky got her 1,000th career point Friday night.
But it wasn’t exactly how she wanted to reach the milestone, in a 45-40 loss to Southington in a CCC girls basketball game.
“She was disappointed,” Farmington coach Keith Garbart said. “Once she scored those points, the first thing she said to me was, ‘I just want to win this game.’ ”
But Southington’s pressure defense, spearheaded by Alli Carr and Livvy Pizzitola, was too muchfor Farmington and Allison Mikosz scored 18 points, including four three-pointers, for the Blue Knights, whoimproved to 5-1.
“I thought Farmington brought a great game. Congrats to Emma,” said Pizzitola, who had seven points. “I thought weplayed our hearts out and made our shots down the stretch.
“We got tips and turnovers and that really helped us out. That was definitely a good game against a great team.”
Novajasky needed 14 points to reach 1,000 and that’s what she got. She scored her milestone basket with 4:41 left in the game and Farmington trailing 43-32. Her parents were able to come to the game and were in the stands.
Farmington (4-2) went on a 7-0 run after the basket to cut the lead to 43-37 with 1:56 left but it was too late.
“It was definitely a game of spurts,” Garbart said. “Both teams were back and forth for a while, and they hit the shots they needed to down the stretch.”
Southington hit six three-pointers and their press was too much for Farmington, which trailed 22-16 at halftime and 32-26 after three quarters.
“Yeah, that was interesting,” Garbart said. “We have good athletes and good guards that can handle the press. We didn’t get the ball in the middle like we should have, like we practiced. We never got into a rhythm against the press. We had silly turnovers.”
In the fourth quarter, the Blue Knights went on an 8-0 run, bookended by threes from Carr and Gabby Dangelo and with 5:59 left, were up, 41-28.
“They’re playing really well,” Southington coach Howie Hewitt said. “We have kids who hustle like crazy. Livvy’s on the floor 32 minutes a night.
“I thought we turned them over a lot. Our offense — we need to keep working on the offense, we need to turn some of the turnovers into points.”
Farmington had a fourgame win streak snapped after losing its opener. Southington lost its second game to Plainville by a point and has won four straight.
The two teams will face each other again in the last game of the regular season March 18.