Lemonade, Semeter's career-high 32 charge up Westborough vs. Marlborough
WESTBOROUGH – Lemonade charged her up.
When the final buzzer sounded, Semeter walked off the court with a career-high 32 points as the Rangers became the first team to defeat Marlborough, 68-53, and join Shepherd Hill atop the Mid-Wach B standings.
What got into Semeter? She ordered a “charged lemonade” earlier in the day at Panera Bread. The extra jolt seemed to agree with her.
“It’s like a caffeine-infused drink, basically,” the captain said with a laugh.
Semeter had 24 points at halftime and Westborough held off Marlborough’s third-quarter flurry behind Rachel junior Rachel Carpenter, who scored 11 of her 21 points in the final period.
“It feels great to push our ranking up,” Semeter said. “Marlborough’s a great team. They pushed us hard and we pushed back.”
After trailing by 20 points, the Panthers clawed back to pull within nine with two minutes remaining before Carpenter and the Rangers (4-4, 4-0 MWB) sealed the victory. Marlborough fell to 7-1, 3-1.
Marlborough senior Bella Miele, a former AAU teammate of Semeter’s, scored 26 points and helped her team rally. With her shooting and driving ability, Westborough coach Erin Studivan hardly felt comfortable despite a double-digit lead for most of the game.
“Never. Nope,” Studivan said. “Not until there was literally 14 seconds left, I turned to my assistant coach and said, ‘I feel okay.’ She is a phenomenal player. She is a great player and I respect her a lot.”
Miele pushed her league-leading scoring average to 20.3 points per game. Semeter is now at 18.
“She’s really fun to play against,” Semeter said of Miele. “There’s no bad attitude coming from her. It’s just friendly competition. I love playing against players like that. It just makes the game more fun.”
Annabelle Semeter was well fueled for a big night, scoring all but two of her team’s first 21 points. The Westborough senior canned four first-half 3-pointers after entering the game with five all season. She scrambled for loose balls and dished out assists.
Meghan Deneen scored 13 points for Marlborough. Kate Sams had nine for Westborough.
Semeter missed most of her volleyball season in the fall due to a broken hand that required surgery, though she did return for the playoffs and helped Westborough win the state championship for the second year in a row.
She missed two basketball games due to a holiday trip to St. Lucia, but entered Friday with back-to-back 20-point games. Semeter bested that total by the second quarter.
“I recently re-found my love for basketball and my goal for this season is to go out there and have fun,” she said. “I'm trying not to let the pressure get to me this season. My teammates make it so easy. We’re all working together and that makes it really fun to be out there.”
Semeter’s hot hand lifted the Rangers to a 19-5 lead that grew to 19 points on three occasions before her 3-pointer in the final minute of the half put her team up 40-20 at the intermission.
Marlborough sliced its deficit in half during the third quarter but Carpenter’s strong play in the fourth closed out the victory.
“We typically come out strong,” Studivan said. “We had a little dip in the third quarter but we regrouped and went out really hard in the fourth quarter.”
Tim Dumas is a multimedia journalist for the Daily News. He can be reached at tdumas@wickedlocal.com. Follow him on Twitter @TimDumas.
This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: Annabelle Semeter's career-high 32 sends Marlborough to first loss
