Staff photo / Brian Yauger. Maplewood senior Morgan Himes dribbles to the basket past the defense of Edgewood’s Carly Kray on Wednesday night in Mecca.

MECCA — Celebrating their seniors and cementing a second straight league championship, the Maplewood Rockets put on a show on Thursday.

In a back-and-forth battle that came down to the final 0.4 seconds, Maplewood took down Ashtabula Edgewood, 46-45.

“It’s senior night, and there’s a lot of emotions and distractions around that, so we had talked about how to compartmentalize that, come out, and focus on the game plan,” Rockets coach Stephanie Pykare said. “We knew Edgewood is a good team, aggressive and scrappy, and, you know, we let them hang. You know, hats off to Edgewood for a great game.”

While some teams may schedule an “easy” game on senior night, Maplewood is not one of those teams. The Rockets have their eyes on the postseason and aren’t wasting any opportunities to get ready and further improve.

“We have expectations, and we want to push ourselves to be better, especially this last stretch of the season,” Pykare said. “We told them that you’ve got to play and earn the win on senior night. (On senior night), teams come in and they want nothing more than to hand us a loss. Last year, we handed (Edgewood) a loss on senior night, so we knew that they weren’t going to give in. Thankfully we had some good moments down the stretch.”

Those good moments include a 3-pointer from freshman Claire Urchek, who finished with a team-high 14 points and the go-ahead bucket from junior Katie Wear in the paint.

Senior Lauran Krieg scored 11 points for Maplewood, while Carly Kray led the Warriors with a game-high 22 points.

With less than a second left and trailing by a point, Edgewood had one last crack at a game-winning shot.

The Rockets, who have made defense a priority and been rewarded for it, did what they did best. Pressure.

“We had to pressure the ball. With 0.4 seconds left, it should only be a tip,” Pykare said. “We knew with (Edgewood forward Faith Vencill) being athletic as she is, that they were going to try something. We talked about Katie (Wear) on the ball, making that pass really hard, and then we got to go up and get it.”

The plan worked, and the Rockets held on to win.

Maplewood has yet to lose in 2026, currently on a 10-game win streak that dates back to a win over Kennedy on Jan. 3. But they’ve been pushed a few times, including the Rockets’ last game, a 44-38 victory over Girard.

“We’ve had two slugfests back-to-back, so we’ve got to wake up and be about the things we’re about,” Pykare said. “It’s been a good test, but we have more tests coming up.”

The Rockets (16-2) end the season with Lakeview, known tournament threat Warrensville Heights and a pair of league games with Chalker and Bristol.