On Tuesday, Jan 16 East Varsity girls basketball team secured a 58-53 win over their crosstown rivals, the Oswego Panthers, in a close game.

East’s offense started off strong with the Wolves outscoring the Panthers 39-28 at the end of the first half. But, their momentum slowed in the 3rd quarter cutting it to a close game with the wolves up only 48-42. 

However, the girls did not give up and fought back during the 4th quarter to secure their win. Leading the team in scoring Tuesday night were Junior point guard Maggie Lewandowski and Sophomore Aubrey Lamberti who both had a total of 16 points during the game.  

Girls Head Varsity basketball Coach, Abraham Carretto, describes how the wolves played against their crosstown rivals. 

“Overall in the first half in our offense, we were moving the ball around well, we got a lot of transition buckets, so that helped us get a lead,” Carretto said. 

Coach Carretto mentioned how they battled through their “stagnant” fourth quarter. 

“At the end when we were down one, nobody really lost their composure as far as what we needed to do in order to get the lead… that to me was huge that we didn’t get too flustered in such a big game,” Caretto said. “Myella got a big steal there and got fouled, made her two free throws and put us up by one. Then Aubrey and Maggie made their free throws and they executed.”

Returning for her third year on East’s Varsity basketball team, Lewandowski discussed what she felt helped them secure a win on Tuesday night.

“We played them already this season so we watched film from that game and then tried to fix things we didn’t do in that game,” Lewandowski said. “We realized what we were doing wrong and then came back from that and made adjustments.” 

Alongside the top scorers Coach Carretto recognized a strong force in the defense that helped lead the wolves to a victory.

“On the defensive end, just being in a better position to defend a little bit better. I think when Cassie came in tonight, to defend the post in the middle, she did a good job of getting a lot of deflections,” Caretto said.

The crosstown game against the Oswego Panthers proves to be more important to fans than other season games as more people fill the stands. This rivalry has been around for years and Lamberti shared her thoughts as to why it may matter more to some players and fans. 

“We’re in the same town and a lot of us know each other on the other team so I think its just fun playing with them,” Lamberti said, “I’ve played with a couple of them and it’s fun but we also know their ways they play so it kind of helps us.”

Many fans turn out for the game and bring energy to cheer the wolves on to a victory. Both the girls and Coach Caretto look forward to the crosstown games every season as it’s an exciting atmosphere. 

“Tonight was nice because the band came out and the cheerleaders did … it’s always nice when the band comes out too, because there’s more noise and they keep the energy up,” Caretto said.

Jordan Fikis, Mae Robinson, and Mia Rivera are staff writers for Oswego East’s online news magazine The Howl.