VSC Lady Eagles taking flight

The Lady Eagles are soaring to new heights.
The Valley Stream Central girls’ basketball team is on the verge of a second straight postseason berth after posting four wins in its last five games to improve to 4-2 in Conference A2 and 8-4 overall on the season. Entering this week’s action, Central was tied with Elmont for second place in the division, two games behind Manhasset with six to play.
Not bad for a program that produced just one win in 2017-18 and two the previous campaign.
The Lady Eagles won six of their final 10 games last winter to reach the playoffs and that success appeared to carry over into the current season with a 3-0 start, including a 69-67 victory over a strong Plainview team in the season opener in which they rallied from 15 points down in the fourth quarter. The girls dropped the next two games playing without injured starting point guard Farrah Pitt and split the next two upon her return before recovering with their recent surge.
Pitt, a junior who enrolled in the district before the start of the school year, has proven to be the glue that holds the team together.

“We’re an entirely different team without her,” head coach Malyssa Thorngren said. “Those were tough losses, but we put people into positions that they aren’t generally in in those two games, [so] I’m not as upset with those two losses.”
All-County center Janay Legagneur is again playing at a high level in her fourth and final varsity season with a 16.5 scoring average. The 6-foot-1 senior was the team’s leading scorer in eight of the 12 games and her 28-point effort against South Side on Dec. 13 was the second highest of her career.
“She’s just a good kid who wants to play and wants to win,” said Thorngren. “She’s somebody who stuck with our program through the bad times when I’m sure that she had people knocking on her door to go other places. Just for her to stick with our program through the losses and now finally see some success [makes me] very happy for her.”
Senior Francis Brown’s return to the team has also been key. She was Central’s top scorer in the other four games and is second on the team with an 11.9 average. Pitt is just below double digits at a 9.5 scoring clip and senior Kailee Finn is at 7.9 while providing excellent rebounding.
After hosting Elmont earlier this week, the Lady Eagles remain home to face Carey on Thursday and Great Neck North next Monday before visiting defending-champion Sewanhaka on Feb. 5. Central is looking to sweep the season series against each of the latter three teams, but Thorngren is not taking anybody in the conference lightly.
“I can’t think of an ‘A’ conference that is much tougher than the one we’re in right now,” she said. “From Manhasset at the top to Elmont to Sewanhaka, we can’t take nights off.”