Milford girls basketball players celebrate their 38-35 win over Alvirne in the finals of the Nashua Holiday Tournament at the Belanger Gym on Saturday. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – Beware of the Spartans.

That should be the message to the rest of Division II as for the second time in two years the Milford High School girls basketball team vanquished two Division I teams en route to the Nashua Holiday Basketball Tournament title.

Milford outlasted a contending Alvirne team 38-35 to capture the tourney title on Saturday at the Belanger Gym, led by Lexi Bausha’s 16 points and eight fourth quarter points by Shea Hansen, including two huge 3-pointers.

“Amazing,” Hansen said of the title accomplishment. “I won it my freshman year and it was really important to me so winning it again is really cool.”

Nashua North took third place in the tourney with a 53-40 win over rival South in the consolation.

Meanwhile, the title game outcome was a big turnaround for the way the first half was for Milford, now 4-0 overall, 2-0 in Division II. Alvirne led 11-5 after one and 17-12 at the half, and trailed by eight early in the third. But a Bausha layup with 16.3 seconds left in the quarter gave Milford a 25-24 lead heading into the final quarter.

“We were staying confident in ourselves because we knew our shots weren’t really falling,” Hanson said. “Just being confident in knowing we could beat (Alvirne) and staying calm and composed throughout it.”

“All we talked about at halftime was ‘Listen, we’re missing shots that we usually make,'” Milford coach Mike Davidson said. “So I knew that if things started to fall our way, I thought we’d pull it out. Shea had those two big 3’s and Lexi was really, really good.”

Alvirne needed its Lexi, but junior Alexis Floyd, the team’s best 3-point shooter, woke up Saturday sick and didn’t play. Thus they couldn’t get the equalizer from long range on their final possession after two Hansen free throws gave the Spartans a 38-35 lead with 11.5 seconds remaining.

“Without our 3 point shooter, we getting those open looks but they weren’t coming from the 3-point specialist,” said Broncos coach Frank Girginis, his team now 4-1 overall (still 3-0 in Divsion I). But again, kudos to them, great game plan, they stuck with it the whole game. I thought we almost had that shot at the end to tie it, but great job by (Milford). … Tough game for Lexi to miss, she’s our zone buster. But hey they (Milford) played hard … We had every opportunity at the end to clamp down and win… Kudos to (Milford). They deserved it. We’re not built to play slow. It was a great game plan by (Davidson). Play zone, suffocate us in.”

Defense got Milford back in it for sure.

“What we like about our defense is there are multiple defenses we can use to throw at a team,” Davidson said. “It really makes them have to think. They call time out to fix it, we call time out and say ‘Let’s switch to this one.'”

Ellianna Nassy added 12 for Milford while Alvirne was paced by Courtney Anderson’s 14 points and eight from Julia Adams. It didn’t help the Broncos that they went 8 of 17 from the line.

In the fourth quarter, Hansen’s first trey made it 33-28 Milford with just over four minutes to go. The Broncos did get a valuable 3-pointer from Adams to close to 33-32, but Hansen answered with her second 3-pointer with 1:38 left to give the Spartans a 36-32 lead.

“Wow, wow, two big shots,” Girginis said. “Big players make big shots in big moments.”

While this was a big moment for Milford, obviously a Christmas tourney title is not where the Spartans want to stop.

“Every game that we’ve played so far, scrimmage or regular season game, has been one step further along our path to where we want to go, in terms of getting better,” Davidson said. “I say to them every day before practice and games, every time you step on the court is a chance to get better. … They’re making very good progress at getting better. We’re excited.”

CONSOLATION GAME

NASHUA NORTH 53, NASHUA SOUTH 40

With the rivalry, this wasn’t your normal consolation, but it looked like a snoozer as the Titans had roared to a 25-8 halftim e lead.

But the Panthers got back to their pressing, 3-point shooting style, twice getting to within three points in a second half comeback. However, with the score 43-40, North’s Madelyn Tino hit a big 3-pointer with 2:13 left to begin a 10-0 North run to end it.

Tino had 14 points but North’s Angela King had 15, all on 3-pointers. South was led by Nicole De Jesus, who was held scoreless in the first half but responded with 16 points in the second, 13 in the third quarter.

“I was so proud of the girls for responding and coming back,” South coach John Bourgeois said. “We’re figuring it out. I’m just happy we were able to respond.”

“I think we let up a little emotionally at halftime, probably my fault,” North coach Curt Dutilley said. “It was good to get a win, get a couple games under our belt … This was great for us. It’s fun.”