SHOOTING STAR: Princeton Day School girls’ basketball player Bridget Kane puts up a jump shot in a game earlier this season. Last Saturday, junior guard and team captain Kane scored 10 points to help PDS edge Princeton High 38-32. On Monday, Kane scored eight points in a losing cause as the Panthers fell 48-42 to Pennington. PDS, now 4-6, hosts Kings Christian on January 11 and Lawrenceville on January 16. (Photo by Frank Wojciechowski)

Trailing 26-15 at halftime against visiting Hun School last Thursday, the Princeton Day School girls’ basketball team wasn’t about to throw in the towel against its crosstown rival.

“We talked it over at halftime and the girls decided that we weren’t going to get slaughtered,” said PDS head coach Kamau Bailey, noting that his team was missing some key players for the contest due to injury and sickness. “We were going to put up a fight.”

The Panthers ended up putting Hun on its heels, utilizing pressure defense to go on a 13-8 run to start the fourth quarter and narrow the gap to 37-34 before falling 46-36.

“Once I figured out that their offense revolved around those two players (Hun’s Jada Jones and Alexis Harvell), we focused on them and that is what really helped get us back in the game,” said Bailey.

“Once Jones gave up the ball, we tried to not let her get it back. We forced the ball to girls on their weak hand and tried to do some adjustments to get back into the game.”

Junior guard Bridget Kane helped trigger the comeback, ending up with a team-high 10 points.

“Bridget did really well; she led with her defensive intensity,” said Bailey of Kane.

“One of the balls got away from her on defense and from that moment on, she was really aggressive. She hit some nice 3s and really just led. She is a captain for a reason; she has great leadership. She comes from a basketball family (father, Ron Kane, is the longtime coach of the Lawrenceville School boys’s hoops team) and you can see that on the floor. I feel like I have an extra coach out there with Bridget Kane, which is awesome.”

The Panthers have been getting awesome play from junior star Ryan Robinson.

“Ryan has been consistent throughout the whole season, playing with a lot of intensity,” said Bailey of Robinson, who had a huge game last Saturday in a 38-32 win at Princeton High as she scored 19 points and grabbed 15 rebounds.

“She takes the ball to the basket hard and has developed quite a good jump shot in the last couple of years. She is also one of my leaders. The work she has done in the offseason on her jump shot has really helped us because in the past, teams were able to just play her drive. She is more confident with her shot.”

A pair of promising freshmen, Carly Kunkle and Riley Felsher, showed their growing confidence in the game against Hun.

“Carly and Riley are freshmen who really stepped up; they both scored a couple of buckets today at times when were having difficulty scoring,” said Bailey. “They came through, these are shots, a few games ago, they weren’t taking or hitting.”

In Bailey’s view, the team’s fight back in the defeat to the Raiders was a definite step in the right direction.

“It was a confidence builder, the girls are all positive in the locker room; we feel like it is a victory because we made some progress,” said Bailey, whose team fell 48-42 to Pennington last Monday to move to 4-6 and will look to get back on the winning track when it hosts Kings Christian on January 11 and Lawrenceville on January 16.

“When we make progress, I always look at that as a victory for a team like us. We were down quite a few girls so for us to play that way under those conditions is excellent.”