Staff photo / Dan Hiner Canfield’s Carly Fleming (22) drives the baseline during the second half of Monday’s game against Poland at Poland Field House.

POLAND — It wasn’t the prettiest, but Canfield girls basketball coach Matt Reel knew it was going to be difficult when the Cardinals suited up to play rival Poland.

There were some missed shots and turnovers, as well as some bodies hitting the hardwood. However, the Cardinals controlled the fourth quarter and came away with a 38-31 victory at Poland Field House on Monday night.

“I kinda look at it like when coach (Joe) Ignazio and coach (Tom) Pavlansky and the football teams play. You know it’s not going to be a 42-40 shootout. It’s going to be long, sustained drives … three yards and a cloud of dust, and that’s kinda what this basketball game was,” Reel said. “I thought whoever got to 40 first was going to win, and neither of us did.

“It was kinda one of those hard slogs, but I thought it was because both teams were playing so well defensively and taking away what the other team does. You gotta give them a lot of credit, because I thought (Poland) played exceptionally well tonight.”

The first quarter was low-scoring, but the teams traded baskets in the final minute of the period. A layup with a couple seconds left by Isabel Greco trimmed Canfield’s lead to 9-8.

However, the offenses had to continue work for shots in the second.

Canfield (8-1) created a few opportunities due to their transition offense, but Poland’s defense in the post didn’t make life easy. Meanwhile, Canfield pressured the ball around the 3-point line, making it hard for the Bulldogs to create space.

In the end, the Cardinals took an 18-15 lead into the locker room.

Poland’s a young group, and at times, they had four freshmen on the court. Monday’s game was their first look at a strong pressure defense, which took some time to figure out.

“We haven’t seen pressure like that all year, and they’re very good at it,” Poland head coach Nick Blanch said. “They did that last year, and again, it was tremendous pressure. Non-stop, and they trap you every chance they can get.

“Our kids, they did a nice job adjusting to it, but you can’t simulate that in practice. So you know what’s coming, you prepare for it and went over it, but simulating that in practice is hard to do.”

A layup by Briella Rowe gave Poland (6-3) a 21-20 lead with 5:16 to play in the third. After another Bulldog basket, the Cardinals called timeout.

The Cardinals regained the lead, 25-23, 90 seconds later when Jenna Triveri hit a three and eventually stretched their lead to six. However, the Bulldogs got a three and a layup at the end of the third cut the deficit to 29-28 heading into the fourth.

Every time Poland tried to retake the lead, the Cardinals responded. Then just like Reel’s football analogy, the Cardinals began to slowly push their lead, like a team driving down the field.

They only made four baskets, including a 3-pointer, but the Cardinals limited Poland to three points in the fourth.

“You see a few (transition baskets) go in, and your offense is flowing a little bit more,” Reel said. “Defensively, what this team’s become really good at is figuring out what the other team wants to do, diagnosing that and adjusting to that. I thought we did that tonight, especially in that fourth quarter.”

With the Bulldogs down seven, Canfield ran off the final minute of play without Poland fouling. Blanch knew Canfield doesn’t miss many opportunities from the free-throw line, so he wanted his girls to pressure the ball in hopes that they could force a turnover.

“It could be right, it could be wrong. I don’t know,” Blanch said. “I just felt like it was a seven-point game, if we could get a tipped ball, go get a layup on the other end and then when you bring it to within five, then you can start to foul. Seven against a good free-throw shooting team like Canfield, I was trying to get the steal instead of sending them to the line and giving them free points.”

Triveri led the Cardinals with 16 points, Carly Fleming added 10 and Lorieona Jannone finished with seven.

Isabel Greco scored a team-high 10 points for the Bulldogs, and Briella Rowe had nine.

The win pushed the Cardinals’ winning streak to eight. They dropped their first game of the season, 35-27 to Stow-Munroe Falls, but bounced back to win six of their last eight by double digits.

“It means a lot to our community, so it’s always great to come here to their home court and get a win,” Triveri said. “They’re well-coached, they had a great game plan against us. We made some shots, hit some shots, so it’s really great to be a part of this.”