The Pine Bush girls’ basketball team had been looking forward to the championship game of the Coaches vs. Cancer tournament ever since winning their opening round game.

For the past several years, they had been losing to the Wallkill Panthers in the championship.

They flipped the script on Saturday, beating the Panthers, 70-63, on Saturday to clinch the tournament championship.

“This is great,” said Pine Bush’s Jah-esa Stokes, who was named the tournament’s most valuable player, after scoring 19 points. “We usually struggled every year beating them. We really haven’t beaten them before, ever, and this year we’ve been great scoring-wise, defensively.

This is like a whole new team from all the previous years.”

The Bushmen had led most of the game until late in the third quarter when Zoe Mesuch, who returned to the lineup last week after suffering an ankle injury on December 16, hit a 3-point basket to tie the game at 51-51.

Mesuch finished with a game-high 29 points and was named to the all-tournament team.

“(Pine Bush coach) Michelle (Bouffard) knows what’s coming,” Wallkill coach A.J. Higby said. “It’s not like it’s a secret who’s going to score points for us. It is what it is.”

Bouffard countered with Leticia Johnson, who has been a top defender for the Bushmen, who limited Mesuch to 12 first-half points. Stokes guarded her late in the game.

“Zoe doesn’t stop running,” Stokes said. “She’s a really good player and really good shooter, probably one of the best. It’s hard to guard her because she does not stop moving. She can shoot. She can drive, but you just have to work.”

Alex Dembinsky gave the Panthers a 53-51 lead with a basket and then Mesuch answered with another of her own, pushing the lead to four points with 37 seconds left in the third quarter.

For as good as Mesuch was, Pine Bush’s Ketura Rutty was right there with her, dominating on the inside on her way to a team-high 27 points and an all-tournament team selection.

Rutty hit two free throws with 24.4 seconds left in the third to send the game into the fourth quarter with the Bushmen trailing by two.

“My teammates were able to get me the ball a lot and I just had to go out for the rebounds, and put it back,” Rutty said. “I kept getting fouled down there, but that didn’t stop me. I kept going.”

Rutty scored the first four points of the fourth quarter on a pair of rebounds, and then Watson knocked down a 3-point basket with 5:30 remaining to give the bushmen a 60-55 lead.

Watson finished with 20 points.

“She fades in the shadows of Ketura and Jah, but she shouldn’t,” Bouffard said. “She should be right up front with them.”

The Panthers scored five quick points on a 3-pointer by Emma Dilemme and a layup by Mesuch to tie the game again.

Samantha Dembinsky scored 13 points and was named to the all-tournament team. Alex Dembinsky added 10.

“I don’t think there’s any other team in Section 9 better than them, except for Lourdes,” Higby said. “They have to – as we’ve talked about – not let the little things beat you. Ketura – as good as she is – beat us. We had no answer for her. We had to take care of everybody else and we couldn’t. That’s a big thing.”

It was Stokes who finished the game, giving the Bushmen the lead with 40 seconds left. She also knocked down 5 of 6 free throws to end the game, cementing her MVP status.

“It means a lot, even though I didn’t score the most points,” Stokes said.

“When you know you can beat a team, you’re going to try your hardest because we’ve been wanting to beat this team since the season started.”

It was the third game of the week for the Panthers, who played two tough games at the Amsterdam College Showcase on Wednesday and Thursday.

The Panthers fell, 58-41, to Shenendehowa on Wednesday and beat Shaker, 64-62, on Thursday.

“After this, we’re OK because we’re not going to see that level of competition,” Higby said.