Rebels Romp to 3rd Place in the League After Securing Victory Over Newcastle Eagles
The Essex Rebels Women’s basketball team is on a roll! After capturing their first win of the season last week against Nottingham, the Rebels secured their second league win this weekend against a feisty Newcastle Eagles team. This moves the team to 2-1 on the season and up to third place on the league table, the highest the team has been in their three years at the professional level.
However, the win didn’t come easy as it was a tale of two halves over the weekend. The first 20 minutes of play were dominated by the Newcastle Eagles. In particular, one Newcastle Eagle – their captain Alison Gorrell. The experienced American scored a staggering 30 points in the half, accounting for most of the visitor’s points. Despite the scoring onslaught of Gorrell, the Rebels hung around, scoring 42 points as a team and heading into the locker room disappointed with their energy and effort, but confident they could turn it around in the second half.
And that’s just what they did! The Rebels came out with defensive intensity that was missing in the first half and held their opponents to just 12 points in the third quarter. A big factor was that of Rebels newest pro signing, DeAngelique Waithe, who took on the challenge to stop Gorrell personally. The sharpshoot who had 30 in the first half, was held to just 10 points in the second half. While the defence intensified, so did the Essex Rebels offence, as the team poured in 35 points in the final ten minutes alone. 16 of those points coming from team captain Andrea Kohlhaas, who knocked down 4 three-pointers and four foul shots to help finish the game in the home teams’ favour.
Head Coach Tom Sadler had this to say after the game, “after the performance we had last week against Nottingham, our confidence grew tremendously as a team. We were able to see our hard work come together and what we are fully capable of achieving when we play the way we can. Unfortunately, that same team didn’t show up to the first half today and we dug ourselves a bit of a hole. But the team held themselves accountable for a lack of energy, stayed positive, and really focused on executing our game plan in the second half. Credit to Newcastle who are an extremely hard-working team and just didn’t stop the entire 40-minutes. They are similar to us and I think both our team and theirs will surprise some other teams in the league throughout the season.”
Top Performers for the Rebels:
Andrea Kohlhaas – 28 points
DeAngelique Waithe – 16 points / 16 rebounds / 4 assists
Carla Bieg Salazar – 16 points / 7 rebounds / 4 assists
Ashleigh Munns – 14 points / 6 assists / 5 rebounds
Top Performers for the Eagles:
Alison Gorrell – 40 points / 12 rebounds / 5 assists
Maddie Mcvicar – 16 points
Abby Lowe – 12 points / 5 assists
The Rebels have a short reprieve from games as the international break occurs, but return to action on February 13th as they take the long drive up to Durham.
