This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Sports

Defense Propels Portland to 9th Straight Win

Force 22 turnovers in win over struggling Westbrook

Portland wasn’t close to hitting on all cylinders. But even on an off night, the Highlanders were leaps and bounds ahead of Westbrook.

Kelly Coleman scored 22 points, an aggressive defense forced 22 turnovers and Portland cruised to its ninth straight win, 52-32, over the Knights in Westbrook on Monday.

Sarah Bierly had 12 points and Lindsey Dionne added 11 points for the Highlanders (15-3, 14-1 Shoreline), who took command with an 18-0 run that bridged the second and third quarters.

Find out what's happening in East Hampton-Portlandwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Portland coach Nick Chaconis was pleased with the defensive effort, which made up for the Highlanders' inability to finish around the rim. 

“A lot of shots were rolling around and out," Chaconis said. "Like most teams if you can’t do it offensively, then we have to pick it up defensively and we are a good defensive team."

Find out what's happening in East Hampton-Portlandwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

That may be true, but the Knights are not a good measuring stick.  Westbrook (1-17, 0-11), which has lost 16 straight, often struggled to advance the ball past midcourt against the Highlanders full-court press.

“We’re 1-17. There’s a reason,“ first-year Westbrook coach Bill Bernard said. “We’ve struggled against most teams.  It’s a process. We have a lot of freshman playing.

“Plus, we clearly don’t have anyone who can respond to Kelly.”

Few teams do.  Perhaps the best player in the Shoreline Conference, Coleman sparked an 8-0 run at the end of the second quarter that gave Portland a 34-16 lead heading into the locker room.

Meghan Bernard (11 points) cut the Highlanders' lead to 26-16 with a three-pointer with 1:53 left in the second quarter. That was as close as the Knights got.

After getting inside for an easy layup, Coleman added a steal and a three-point play that made it 31-16 with less than a minute left in the half. Bierly then came up with a steal and set up Dionne’s three-pointer with seven seconds remaining.

Coleman and company picked up where they left off in the third quarter and the lead swelled to 44-16 on a layup from Bierly with 4:04 remaining in the third.  With the game well in hand, Chaconis pulled his starters for the remainder of the period.

“We finally made some things happen," Chaconis said.

Chaconis attributed the rustiness to all the missed practices and cancelled games.

“The one thing that’s starting to show, like a lot of schools, we haven’t had practice,” he said. “I thought tonight there were a lot of mistakes, mentally and physically.  We’ve got to get back in the gym and run some drills.”

Chaconis added that his team won’t be able to get by with the mistakes they made once the conference and CIAC tournaments begin.

“We just have to do everything better,” he said. “A missed assignment, a bad pass, things like that could end your season.”

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?