DeLaSalle edges Mahtomedi in Section 4AAA

<p>Here&#39;s what happened.</p> <p>It had been a hard-fought, competitive game, as you’d expect. And, it was 39-all when Annika Sougstad grabbed a defensive rebound and Mahtomedi called timeout with 0:15.9 on the clock.</p> <p>Coming out of the timeout, the Zephyrs swung the ball around to Marisa Gustafson on the right wing with 7 or 8 ticks left on the clock. A DeLaSalle defender (I’m not going to say which one) rushed out to defend the wing except, well, she forgot to stop, or something. She crushed Gustafson like a free safety hitting a wide receiver over the middle. Gustafson crashed to the floor. The ball bounced off of Gustafson lying on the floor—and rolled over to an official standing not 5 feet away across the sideline. He scooped up the ball a and pointed the other way with 0:05.2 remaining.</p> <p>All that remained was for DeLaSalle to rush down the court and put up a shot, which missed. But Olivia Travis was there to rebound the ball, and to put it back up and in for her only points of the night as the buzzer sounded.</p> <p>Some who saw the game might say, truthfully enough, that Mahtomedi had plenty of opportunities to win the game, and didn&#39;t do it. The Zephyrs did not play well. Their ball-handling is not very good. They shot 13-of-41, according to my unofficial numbers. They were up 33-26 at the 10 minute mark and didn&#39;t close it out. They went 8 minutes without a field goal. They let DeLaSalle grab that crucial offensive board with one tick left on the clock.</p> <p>All true. But Mahtomedi played hard and played great defense. DeLaSalle played hard and played great defense. DeLaSalle did nothing wrong, by the way, and I mean no disrespect to the Islanders.</p> <p>But, it was perhaps the worst piece of officiating I&#39;ve seen in 2,000-3,000 basketball games. I wish I hadn&#39;t seen it. I wish I had gone to a different game. But, that&#39;s what happened.</p>