By Ron Poniewasz Jr.
New Castle News

The struggles continue for the New Castle High girls basketball team.

The Lady ’Canes dropped their fifth straight game last night, 50-46 to Beaver in WPIAL Section 2-AAA action at the Ne-Ca-Hi Field House.

The losing streak is the longest in 10 years for New Castle. The Lady ’Canes (7-4 section, 11-8 overall) are learning to play without star senior Kaylynn Waters, who tore her right anterior cruciate ligament last month.

New Castle was just 8-14 in the 2001-2002 season.

“I saw some good things and some bad things,” Lady ’Canes coach Jason Rankin said. “We got some contributions off the bench.

“The one thing that’s happening is we’re getting good contributions from individual players but not the team. I think our resolve can be there and we’re understanding we have to play a different way. We just have to be able to knock down shots from more than one person.”

There was some positive news for New Castle, as senior standout Christina Talbert surpassed the 1,000-point plateau in the loss. Talbert recorded the milestone with four minutes left in the second quarter when she drove to the basket and dropped in a floater.

“That’s a tremendous accomplishment for any player to score 1,000 points,” Rankin said. “Offensively, she’s never truly been the first option for us.

“I’ve been blessed to have incredible offensive talent. It’s a great accomplishment and I’m proud of her. In three years (as New Castle head coach) I’ve had three 1,000-point scorers. She does a lot of great things for us.”

Talbert joined LaShauna Brothers and Waters as 1,000-point scorers under Rankin’s direction.

Though Talbert, who has 1,003 career points, hit the milestone, she was held to just eight points. The Lady Bobcats (6-5, 12-8), who are coached by former Neshannock mentor Greg Huston, played a box-and-one defense to contain her.

“The box-and-one is certainly a possibility,” Rankin said of what his team might see from opposing defenses in the playoffs. “One thing we have to do is to get better at it.

“We didn’t play well against a box-and-one offensively (last night).”

New Castle trailed 36-24 in the third quarter before rallying. The Lady ’Canes were down 47-44 with just over a minute remaining and 49-46 with 30 seconds to go after a putback by Kelsey Scott.

But Beaver split a pair of foul shots with 6.2 seconds left to seal the win.

New Castle’s Rachael Razzano led all scorers with 19 points, including 14 in the second half. Scott followed with 10 markers.

Ally Dehart paced Beaver with 17 points.

The Lady ’Canes are in third place with one section game remaining at Ambridge on Friday. A win locks up third place outright.

The WPIAL playoff pairings will be announced Feb. 14.

(E-mail: rponiewasz@ncnewsonline.com).