In the early going of the 2025-26 season, Chatham High School (N.J.) Girl’s Basketball team has been up and down.
But after Monday night’s performance, behind 21 points from senior Ava Paone, it looks as if the Cougars took a step in the right direction, as they defeated Cranford, 42-35, at home in Day 3 (their second) of the Cougar Classic Tournament.
With one of its best players (Paone) in foul trouble, coach Joe Gaba said he decided to sit her for a little while so she would not get another one so early in the game. After enduring some third period challenges, Chatham (3-4) was able to right the ship in the fourth quarter.
“We’re starting to put things together,” Gaba said with conviction. “One, we defended much better tonight. I think we held them to six points in the second quarter. With Ava having three fouls, I just tried to take her off so she wouldn’t pickup her fourth one. We kind of fell apart a little bit there. But we weathered the storm, and got it done in the fourth quarter.
The Cougars trailed Cranford, 12-11, after the first period despite sophomore Lucy Arps’ six points.
But Chatham chipped away at Cranford’s lead and surged ahead, 17-16, after Paone drilled a three pointer with 2:32 left in the first half.
Paone dropped in another basket to give the Cougars a three-point advantage before Cranford (3-3) cut the deficit to 19-18 by quarter’s end.
Paone opened the second half with a basket, and Chatham followed that up with two successful free throws to extend its lead to 25-20 with 7:26 remaining in the third period.
With four points each from Arps and Paone, the Cougars held a slight three-point advantage going into the final quarter.
Although Paone sparkled on the hardwood, Paone gave credit to her teammates for feeding her the rock in the exact spots that she needed to drain shots. Plus, she said it was an overall team effort on both ends of the floor that led to the win.
“My teammates found me in the right places,” Panone said of her scoring prowess Monday. “We knew we had to push the ball in transition to get open looks and score. We played really good defensively and offensively.”
After a Cranford bucket, junior Noelle Grady banged home one from beyond the arc to put the Cougars back up again by three points with 5:51 left in the contest.
To the nail in the coffin, Chatham went on an 8-3 run the rest of the way, dribbling away with a solid victory.
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