Heartbreak doesn’t describe the feeling of O’Neill High School’s basketball team, coaches and fans at the end of last Thursday’s Section 9, Class C championship game. The Raiders, who battled for the entire 32 minutes of the game, lost 40-39 to Tri-Valley.

The Raiders were charged with two fouls in the last seconds of the game, and with just eight seconds left in the game, Tri-Valley’s Jenna Carmody sank a tie-breaking free throw to give the Bears the one-point advantage. Fans on the Raider side of the gymnasium questioned those late fouls, but to no avail.

The Raiders went into the game as Class C’s second seed to Tri-Valley’s one seed – the two teams had split wins during two games in the regular season.

For the Bears, Carmody scored 15 points in the game, Avery Carrier had 10 and Allyson Chevalier and Jordan Dymond had six each. For O’Neill, Abby Richardson led the scoring with 15 points, including four three-pointers – including a long toss to tie the game at 27-27 just before the end of the third quarter.

Richardson’s final three-pointer came with 19.9 seconds left in the game and gave the Raiders a 39-39 lead. Then, with 14.6 seconds left the Raiders fouled Kaitlin Stungis, who hit one of two shots to tie the game at 39-39. Play got down to 7.9 seconds, and O’Neill fouled again, giving Carmody her shot.

The Raiders called a time out after that, had the ball. Richardson heaved the ball inbounds toward her teammates, but a Tri-Valley defender grabbed it, sealing the win.

It was a physical game, with Tri-Valley getting a technical foul early in the second half. There was also a brief black-out during the game where the entire gymnasium went dark for several seconds.

Tri-Valley led most of the game; it took the Raiders until there were just three minutes left in the third quarter to tie the game for the first time.

For O’Neill, Bella Alberici had eight points, Grace O’Connell had six, CJ Conkey had five, Victoria Evangelista had three (including the first basket of the day for the Raiders) and Roni Arbogast had two.

The Raiders had a large fan base in Mount Saint Mary College’s Kaplan Center, including fans ‘left over’ from the first game of the day, when the O’Neill boys played Burke. The majority of the boys’ team stayed to watch the girls, providing a large, loud cheering section.

Tri-Valley was to go on to play the Section 1 Class C winner on Tuesday.

To get to the championship game, the Raiders beat Onteora 42-34 in the semi-final game, played on March 4 at O’Neill. The Raiders led that game the entire contest. In it, Richardson had 15 points, Alberici had 11, and Conkey and Evangelista each had eight. In that game, Layla Bellevue was a “game changer with her defensive energy,” Coach Darren Sorenson said. Alberici, he added, was “tough inside” in that game, and he noted her rebounding skills were evident.

“I thought we were tough today,” he said, “defensively we were really, really good. We did a good job keeping them off the glass.”

After that game, Alberici said the team had been working hard to prepare for the sectionals. Both she and Richardson took a minute that day to call out Bellevue too – “We put in Layla to put pressure on,” Richardson said. “She’s super quick and she makes other players fumble, causing turnovers. She’s always moving.”