Northfield senior Emily Martin fires up a shot against Windsor in last Saturday afternoon's Div.III quarter-final. Emily had seven points and numerous steals but the Lady Marauders bowed to the Yellow Jackets 31-29. Photo by Bill Croney, The Northfield News In a game where both teams displayed classic signs of play off jitters the Lady Marauders saw their season come to a close with a 31-29 loss to Windsor in the Div. III quarterfinals on Saturday afternoon at the High School gym.

The dramatic, hard fought, emotional game was riddled with turnovers by both teams.(20 turnovers in the first half alone) and they each seemed to take turns giving each other the ball.

Full court pressure throughout no doubt caused turnovers and very aggressive defense formed a parade to the foul line but when push came to shove Windsor, a team that has been to the state finals for the past four years, rose to the challenge.

Both teams shot poorly from the field and at halftime the Windsor lead stood at 20-14. It seemed for a long time that just might be the final score, but the hoops finally opened up wide enough to accept the basketball and both the Yellow Jackets and the Lady Marauders started to put points on the board.

Windsor opened the fourth quarter with the first four points to take a 27-21 lead but Northfield finally got their offense clicking and went on a 6-2 run in a four minute span to close the Yellow Jacket lead to two.

If the ball game was a musical instrument it would have been an accordion. The Windsor lead stretched out to six or seven but the Lady Marauders would close it to three or four over the last quarter. But like the Accordion the ends never quite. Touched.

Melissa Kelsey (seven rebounds) brought Northfield within 30-29 with 37 seconds left. The Marauders had possession under their own basket out of a timeout with 17 seconds left, still down 30-29, and were able to get two shots off before turning the ball over. Windsor's Kaitlin Callahan, fouled seven seconds later, hit the back end of two free throws to boost the Yellow Jacket lead to 31-29. Hood stole the ensuing inbounds pass, but Susmann stole it back and was able to get a clear shot off from the foul line only to have it sail under the bottom of the net as time expired.

Led by junior Kaitlyn Callahans's and Morgan Farnsworth’s 9 points, the Yellow jackets pressured and ran with Northfield. Windsor led 14 - 20 after the first half. Freshman (guard) Meghan Mc Mullen (4 points) and Junior forward Melissa Kelsey (2 points and 10 rebounds) provided secondary support for an marauder team rebounding from a mediocre performance 9 for 42 from the floor.

"We got down by too much early in the game," coach Laurie Shepard said. "We clawed our way back into in the second with some defensive adjustments. By halftime we felt like we were in a position to stay in the game if we could establish a few things starting the third period."

Northfield was paced by Jackie Susmann's 10 points, 11 boards and two steals, and Kaitlyn McMullen added nine points and nine boards. Emily Martin added four points – all free throws – and four rebounds and three steals for the Marauders. "We are normally a very good foul-shooting team," Shepard said. "We came into our own in the last two or three weeks of the season, and the last three games of the season we won at the foul line."

Even when the Marauders tightened their defense in the third, the Hornets were still able to keep the lead, and seemed set to win their second game of the tournament. However, with junior Brittany Patenaude unable to play most of the third and part of the forth because of foul trouble, the Northfield Hoopsters were unable to sustain their play.

"We gave a lot of physical effort but were making poor decisions with the ball," Shepard said. "Turnovers have really killed us this year. Some adjustments were being made to limit mistakes rather than finding production."

Northfield ends the season at 17-4. The No. 2 seed was the Marauders' highest since they earned the No. 1 seed in 1982. The Marauders have not advanced past the quarterfinals since 2002.

Windsor (14-7) – which lost the D-III final last winter, lost in the semifinals in 2008 and won it in 2007, all as a No. 1 seed – will face No. 3 Montpelier (17-4) in the late semifinal Thursday at 8:15 p.m.

"To go into that locker room, my heart is in there with them," Northfield coach Lori Shepard said. "I have been here for 14 years and I have never had a more hard-working group that respected each other. I told them that it's going to hurt and you have to let it hurt, but you also have to hold your heads up high because they just played the state runner up last year and the state champ from the year before. It was an amazing season. We beat teams this year like Montpelier that we haven't beat in like 20 years, and Enosburg in 15 years. I couldn't be more proud of these kids."

"They played extremely hard and our kids did, too," Mackay said. "Maybe just being to Barre a couple of times and being in the tournament helped us a little at the end as far as making a couple better decisions with the ball."

"The thing that disappointed me, and we had been working all week in practice on getting the big girls in foul trouble and we succeeded, but when we got both of them out of the game, we did not capitalize on that at all," Shepard said. "I was looking for a run to be put together when we had (Farnsworth) and (Hood) out. And that never happened. They went to man and put a lot of pressure on us. We've been working on our inside-outside game, and I think we were holding on to the ball a little too much in the post."

WINDSOR (31)

Wright 0 0-0 0, M. Callahan 0 0-0 0, Coley 1 0-0 2, K. Callahan 1 1 4-7 9, Bruno 2 1-4 5, White 0 0-0 0, Wilcox 1 0-0 2, Matos 0 0-0 0, Farnsworth 4 1-6 9, Hood 2 0-0 4.

Totals 11 1 6-17 31.

NORTHFIELD (29)

Grant 0 0-2 0, Susmann 3 4-6 10, McLellan 0 0-0 0, Martin 0 4- 6 4, Kelsey 1 0-0 2, M. McMullen 2 0-3 4, Weggler 0 0-2 0, K. McMullen 3 3-3 9.

Totals 9 11-22 29.

Windsor 11 9 3 8 – 31 Northfield 6 8 7 8 – 29

Northfield Finished the season as the #2 seed with exceptional play and leadership from its four seniors Jackie Susmann, Kaley Warren, Emily Martin and Mackenzie Neun. It has been a pleasure to watch and report on you. Thank you all for the memories.