SUNAPEE
Sunapee’s roster trimmed to just seven players as four Lakers, two starters, were suspended for the game.
Sunapee coach Faith Larpenter engineered the domestic violence awareness night with the death of her friend, Chrystal Anne Lewis, in 2017, still much on her mind.
“When we met we just clicked, and she was just like an older sister to me,” Larpenter said. “My family and hers would always go to different horse pulls together throughout the summer. There are now different memorial horse pulls in her memory during the summer.”
According to the New Hampshire Attorney General’s office Robert Taylor, 45, shot and killed Lewis, 44, in her Haverhill home before Taylor turned the gun on himself.
Taylor was an ex-boyfriend and the deaths were ruled a murder-suicide.
On Friday night, Larpenter encouraged all those attending to wear purple. There was a donation bowl and purple bracelets were sold at the door, with the proceed going to Claremont’s Turning Points, which is an agency offering support to male and female survivors of domestic violence.
Numerous shades of purple were in evidence throughout the stands.
Derryfield (11-4) was favorite against the Lakers (5-8), although Sunapee has been playing better of late, having won five of its last six and only loss at Derryfield, 43-39 on Jan. 2.
Fiona Nolan scored 16 points and Elizabeth Bennett 14 for the Lakers, who host Mount Royal on Tuesday.
The play at times was ragged — there were 26 personal fouls in the first half — but the Lakers, after switching for a zone to man-to-man, turned the game around.
The Lakers were down 13-11 at the end of the first period, and their center, Miah Hamm, went to the bench at the 2:21 mark with three fouls. But the Lakers, now getting some footing with the man-to-man defense, had a 12-5 edge in the second quarter.
Back came the Cougars in the third quarter, and the game was tied at 30-30 going into the final eight minutes. It was at this point Sunapee went on a 7-2 spurt to take a lead it never relinquished.