By ALEX SPONSELLER The Pilgrim girls basketball team dropped a tough 42-40 decision to Central during its season opener at Vets last week.

The Pats offense was steady and consistent throughout much of the contest, however, Central wore down the Pilgrim defense in the second half to complete the comeback win. The Knights’ first lead of the game came with 4:30 remaining in regulation, and they would be able to hold on to secure the victory.

Central’s size and durability in the paint was the difference in the loss, according to Pilgrim coach Scott Bayha.

“(Central) had a series down there where they got about eight rebounds in a row. They got two shots for about every shot they took (in the second half). We knew what we needed to do, we needed to force them to shoot from the outside which worked pretty well. Once they got (Pilgrim forward) Giana Ramos in foul trouble, that took away our size down low which really hurt us in the end. We’ll rebuild,” said Bayha.

Kelsey Burr led the Pats with a game-high 13 points scored, while Emma Corcoran and Faith Meade each scored six. Tyniece Hedges led Central with 11 points.

Despite the loss, Bayha was encouraged by the team’s first outing in a new division.

“I told the girls that, ‘Hey, we’re playing basketball.’ We lost by two, last year we lost to them by seven and we graduated a lot when they barely graduated anyone. That’s pretty good for us, I was pretty happy with that. I was actually pretty happy with how they shot, we didn’t hit enough layups but we shot well from the outside. This year’s team can score but we need to learn how to defend,” said Bayha.

Bayha was also excited to see Burr step up on the offensive end. Burr emerged as an outside scoring threat and had a breakout game in the quarterfinals last season, and is expected to continue to be key to the Pilgrim offense moving forward.

“She was running our offense and calling out basketball plays. Sometimes we play like robots and are so focused on running the play, but Kelsey was acknowledging the open spot and moving to it. Kelsey played really well. We played so many girls over the past few years, they’re ready to play, they’ve put the work in,” said Bayha.

The Pats were scheduled to be back at it against Burrillville on Monday, but the game was postponed due to the winter storm. Pilgrim faced Classical on Wednesday, but the results were not available at press time.

“We’re in DII now, and judging right now, we may be better than we were last year. I want to see every game be this close,” Bayha said. “If you win by two, it’s on the players, if you lose by two, it’s on the coach. We’ll get there, we’ll get back at it.”