With the unusual basketball season due to COVID-19, Parkland head girls basketball coach Ed Ohlson had his doubts that his team would be playing in March.

The Lady Trojans did. And they did it in grand style.

Parkland advanced to the District 11 Class 6A championship game and suffered a hard-fought 39-31 loss to Nazareth March 11 at Allentown’s PPL Center.

The Trojans, who were seeded second in the tournament behind top-seeded Nazareth, ended their year with an overall 15-3 mark.

“It’s March and we’re still playing,” said Ohlson. “And all the things we had to go through, I’m happy as anything. We talked about when this whole thing hit last year that we wanted to not survive, we wanted to thrive. And I think the girls did that. They did a lot of stuff on their own because I couldn’t be part of it.”

Parkland, which trailed by as many as eight or more points at times, battled back to cut Nazareth’s lead to 21-20 on Maddie Siggins’ bucket with 3:34 left in the game. But Nazareth’s Tayla Brugler, who has a game-high 16 points, scored six straight points that gave the Blue Eagles a lead Parkland couldn’t surpass down the stretch.

Senior center Lindsay Berger, who had eight points, opened the fourth quarter with a bucket that brought Parkland to within 27-24, but the Trojans couldn’t close the gap. Fellow senior Sonya Shivok led Parkland with 12 points.

“We had some nice looks and we talked about it at halftime,” added Ohlson. “We felt that it might get there, but it never happened. I’m proud of them, and we played pretty good defense.

“Hopefully, we’ll get back at it soon. We’ll have some other girls step up to be leaders and do the same kind of things our seniors did and bring everybody with them.”

Berger knew her team had to be consistent.

“If you don’t have a lead against them, it is always hard,” she said. “We had a back-and-forth game with them, but we couldn’t get enough shots to fall. They had great plays, but I thought our defense was there.

She believes the team is in a good position next year with only the loss of her and Shivok.

“They’re in great hands,” she stressed. “Sonya and I tried to coach in practice and take players under our wings. We’re confident that we’ll be blessed with a really solid basketball team. These have been four fantastic years. I have better things ahead for me, but I always will be grateful for this team.”

Siggins, a freshman whose brother JT was a senior on the boys’ team, had a positive feeling about the year.“

“The seniors did take us in, and I saw us coming here because of it,” she said. “They pushed us the entire season. We came up short, but we gave it everything we had.”

Ohlson is confident about his core for next season.

“Hopefully, we’ll get back at it soon,” he said. We’ll have some other girls step up to be leaders and do the same kind of things our seniors did and bring everybody with them.”