The 2025-26 season is proving to be a tough one for the Moon High School Lady Tigers Basketball team.
Coming off the back of consecutive playoff appearances, the Lady Tigers were hoping to make it three postseason berths in a row this season. Despite only having two players from last year’s team graduate, the Tigers haven’t been able to find the success they had last season.
Following their loss at home to Montour, the Tigers fell to 1-5 in section play, placing them sixth in the standings. Their only section victory came against New Castle High School; it was an impressive win as Moon triumphed 71-21, but when placed in the context of New Castle not winning a game all year, it might say more about their opponent than the Tigers themselves.
Overall, the Moon Ladies Tigers have a 4-9 record thanks to out-of-section victories against Union Area, Hopewell and Armstrong.
Senior forward Maria Depner leads the Tigers in points and rebounds per game, but she sustained an injury in the game against Montour. Depner joins fellow senior Jaedin Griggs on the sideline; Griggs, who currently sits at 995 career points, tore her ACL before the season began.
The Lady Tigers will have no choice but to overcome these injuries in the second half of the season. With eight games remaining and only two of them at home, Moon will have to show their fight at away games that can be hostile (trips to West Allegheny and Montour await them).
When asked what the team will have to do to improve in the second half of the season, junior guard Anya Schwartz identified the inability to close out games as an important area to improve upon. She cited the Tigers’ narrow loss to Montour as an example. “With our very young and inexperienced team,” Schwartz said, “we started really good [sic] in the first half. Then we can’t finish.” The Tigers went on to lose to the Spartans 49-43 despite having led to start the fourth quarter.
It may be nigh on impossible for the Tigers to claw back a playoff spot at this point; they’d have to be nearly perfect in section play from here on out and would require a lot of favors from other teams. But even just showing improvement in different areas on the court would be an achievement for a Moon Lady Tigers Basketball team that has faced so much adversity this season.
