Marietta’s Hayleigh Chidester dishes to teammate Braxtyn Kroft during a game against Waterford Saturday at Harry Cooper Annex. (Photo by Mike Morrison)

WATERFORD – After dropping back-to-back overtime losses in their past two games the Marietta Tigers were looking for something positive to come out of Saturday afternoon’s contest against the defending state champion Waterford Wildcats at the Harry W. Cooper Annex.

First-year Marietta head coach Ali Shane and her Tigers got what they were looking for and more as they scored a 48-37 win over Waterford in a game that might not have been as closely contested as the final score suggests.

Marietta forced the Wildcats into 30 turnovers in the game as they built a large lead early on and then held Waterford at bay the rest of the way to finish their regular season with an 11-11 record.

“When you get a chance to play against such a great team as Waterford you always want to come out with a chip on your shoulder and keep it there and play with a little bit of grit,” said Marietta first-year head coach Ali Shane. “I know Waterford is not having the year that they want to have but it does not negate how talented they are and I was really happy with the way the kids came out and kind of jumped on them early.”

The Tigers are forced to play the rest of the season without the services of injured freshman point guard Blaire Reed but senior Hayleigh Chidester took over most of the ball handling duties early and did an outstanding job of running the Tiger offense.

With Chidester at the point it opened up some things for the Tigers offense and specifically junior Braxtyn Kroft who knocked down a pair of triples in the opening quarter as the Tigers built a 17-4 lead.

Things only got worse for the Wildcats early in the second quarter as Marietta out-pointed them 6-2 early in the quarter to open up a 23-6 lead.

Freshman Emmy Ward got the run going with a two-pointer off of an assist from Chidester before buckets by Chidester and junior Fiona Fowler increased the Tiger lead to 17.

Waterford answered the Tiger run with a much needed one of their own as they scored six consecutive points to close the lead back to 11.

A two-pointer by Ava Hurley and back-to-back field goals by Brynlee Pottmeyer allowed the Wildcats to trim the lead to 23-12.

Later in the quarter Tiger senior Lauren Elliott connected on a three-pointer before Hurley closed out the half with a bucket for the home team to send them to the locker room staring at a 28-16 deficit.

Waterford uncharacteristically turned the ball over nine times in the opening quarter and three more times in the second.

“We knew if we didn’t take care of business from the jump that they would get the momentum and it could get ugly,” said Shane. “We wanted to jump on them early and often and pressure them and I was really pleased with how the kids executed.” Marietta was able to push their lead to as many as 17 points in the second half and never really faced a significant threat from the ‘Cats before settling for the 11-point win.

Chidester led a balanced Tiger scoring attack with 12 points while Fowler and Elliott added 11 apiece.

Kroft chipped in with eight points while matching Elliott’s five boards for the team lead and also registering five steals.

Shane felt like Chidester’s calming presence with the ball in her hands made a huge difference.

“We lost a really good ball-handler and shooter in Blaire Reed and although Hayleigh (Chidester) would probably rather be banging around inside she does a lot of good things with the ball in her hands,” said Shane, “To have someone so multi-dimensional like her is so important to our team.”

The Tiger head coach also had a huge amount of praise for the job that Elliott has done especially in the second half of the season when the Tigers have won seven of their last 10 games.

“She (Elliott) got to play a little bit last year but the player she has grown into as far as leadership goes and as far as confidence goes has blown me away,” said Shane. “She has been so crucial in all of our wins and what she does for us as far as knowing her role and executing it perfectly goes way beyond what I could have imagined for her.”

Waterford slipped to 12-9 on the season with one last regular season game left at home on Wednesday night against the arch-rival Fort Frye Cadets.

Hurley led the way for the Wildcats with 17 points including three from behind the arc.

Pottmeyer and Elsie Malec added six apiece for Waterford, which will begin tournament play on Feb. 24 at Southeastern High School.

The Tigers will open tournament play at home Monday when they host Washington Courthouse.

“We get them at our place and we are just wanting to continue this little streak that we have going on,” said Shane. “We want to come out ready to play and not put ourselves in a hole that we have to dig out of and jump on them early and often like we did today.