HARDWICK – Dominant wins over Spaulding and Thetford Academy last week pushed the Hazen Union girls basketball team’s win streak to nine games, improving to 10-1 on the season.
Kelsie Rivard punished the Crimson Tide with a game-high 32 points last Wednesday night as Hazen rolled to a 69-48 win at home. The junior star has scored 92 points over her last three games and is only a handful of points away from being the next 1,000-point career scorer for the program. Isabelle Gouin scored 11 points, fellow senior Julia des Groseilliers added nine and Mya Lumsden chipped in with seven in the win. Rory-Anne Glassford tried to keep Spaulding within striking distance with 21 points and Sophie Guarriello added 13 points and seven assists in the loss. The Crimson Tide fell to 3-7 on the season as they finished up a brutal four games stretch against powerhouse Oxbow, North Country, Lamoille and now Hazen.
The Lady Cats pulled away in the second half behind a season-high 19 points from des Groseilliers in a 50-22 road win over Thetford Academy on Friday night. Hazen’s offense sputtered early, taking a 19-8 lead into the break with limited minutes from Rivard. A 22-5 run to open the second half put the game away behind Autumn Dailey (eight points), Mya Lumsden (seven) and a pair of threes from Taylor Thompson. Kassidy Gann chipped in with 4 points for Hazen in the win. Natalie Perry led the Lady Panthers with seven points as they fell to 3-10. It’s the second year of a total rebuild for a Thetford program that won 32 games over a two-year span, including a trip to the 2023 Division III state title game.
“We just need to keep fine tuning our own stuff,” said head coach Randy Lumsden. “We need to make sure that what we are doing is well refined by playoff season,”
Lumsden once again has his team positioned at the top of the Division III standings ahead of Windsor, Bellows Falls and Oxbow. Windsor defeated the Lady Cats last March in the state title game and have cut down the nets at the Barre Auditorium three of the last four years. Hazen bested Windsor two years ago to bring the program’s first state championship back to Hardwick in over three decades. The Lady Yellowjackets are loaded once again this season, but Lumsden is only focused on pushing his team to play their best brand of basketball come tournament time.
“I’ve learned over the last three years that you can’t worry so much about what all the other teams in our division are doing. We do make small adjustments and talk about opponent’s player tendencies, but 90% of our focus is on what we need to do. That’s what we can control,” said Lumsden.
Rivard is set to become the first Lady Cat underclassmen to reach 1,000 career points since the great Jenn des Groseilliers and has positioned herself to do so at home on Wednesday night against U-32. Hazen will make the short trip to Morrisville for a highly anticipated match-up against Peoples Academy on Friday. All home games can be live streamed on Hardwick Community Television (hctv.us).
