Greenwich High School’s girls basketball team entered Friday night’s game against FCIAC rival Staples riding a three-game winning streak, including a key comeback win over conference foe New Canaan, yet consecutive victory No. 4 didn’t happen for the Cardinals.

Staples sophomore guard Sarah Von Dohlen made sure of that.

Von Dohlen scored a game-high 27 points, scoring from all areas of the court, to propel Staples past the Cardinals, 48-31, in an FCIAC matchup. The road triumph improved the Wreckers’ record to 7-7 overall and 5-4 in the FCIAC. Greenwich has an overall record of 9-5 and an FCIAC mark of 5-4

Senior guard/tri-captain Megan Geiger was Greenwich’s top scorer with 10 points and teammate Madi Utzinger, a sophomore guard, added nine points. The Cardinals trailed 9-4 at halftime, 26-20 at halftime and struggled with its perimeter shooting throughout this FCIAC game.

“They (Staples) were hyper aggressive and we knew that going in,” Greenwich coach Megan Wax said. “I felt we did OK for a while, our shots weren’t falling and they didn’t end up falling at all during the game.”

Von Dohlen scored 17 points during the first half, 11 of which came during the Wreckers’ 17-point second quarter. She made four 3-pointers for the game to power the visitors’ offense.

“Sarah is probably the leading scorer in the FCIAC and she doesn’t get mentioned anywhere, she doesn’t get enough credit from the media,” Staples coach Paco Fabian said. “She can match up with anybody.”

Sophomore Freya Harvey added seven points, including a 3-pointer, for the Wreckers, who exhibited a strong defensive effort throughout, applying full court pressure the majority of the game.

“We had to make changes, we were really struggling earlier in the year defensively,” Fabian noted. “We were honestly one of the worst defensive teams around, we were giving up 60 points a game the first six games and we made some changes.”

“I give all the credit to the girls, they bought into it and we started to communicate, player harder defense and rebound a lot better,” Fabian continued. “Since we’ve done that we’ve been a better basketball team.”

For the second straight game the Cardinals had trouble generating points in the first quarter. They were held to two points in their win against visiting New Canaan on Tuesday night and Friday night, the Cards trailed the Wreckers, 6-0, in the final minute of the opening quarter. Staples wound up taking a 9-4 lead into the second quarter.

Utzinger drove left and converted a layup, cutting the visitors’ lead to 9-6 with 6:35 to go in the second quarter, then Von Dohlen drove baseline for a layup and converted another layup, putting Staples on top, 13-6. Utzinger scored off a spin move, while being fouled, then swished the ensuing free throw, bringing GHS to within 13-10 at the 4:43 mark of the second period.

Yet Staples opened a double-digit advantage with a 10-2 run. Freshman forward Chloe Smith’s basket and Von Dohlen’s 3-point shot capped the 10-2 spurt, giving the Wreckers a 23-12 edge with 2:50 left in the second quarter.

The Cards closed to within six points at halftime (26-20), behind two foul shots from Geiger and three points from junior forward Kate Baxendale, including a long two-pointer from the left corner at the buzzer.

Greenwich was forced to play with a short bench the majority of the matchup due to several injuries.

Senior center/forward Julia Monteiro is sidelined with a knee injury, senior starting point guard Ayanna Davenport started the game, but left late in the first half with an illness and sophomore guard Juliette Pelham, who played in the first half, didn’t return to action in the second half with an injury. Greenwich is already without the services of junior guard Alyssa Gath, who is sidelined the remainder of the season with a knee injury.

“You can’t predict what’s going to happen and that was the worst-case scenario,” Wax said of the injuries.

Wax noted that Davenport’s status for the team’s next game is TBA and Pelham should be able to return to action.

“We need to get a little healthy,” the Cardinals coach said. “We definitely need to rest up and get back to our fundamentals.”

The second half began with Geiger nailing a 3-pointer from the right corner, cutting Staples edge to 26-23. Staples, however, went on a 9-0 spurt and led for double-digits for most of the second half.

A pair of foul shots by Smith, a basket by Von Dohlen and a pull-up jump shot by Von Dohlen made it 35-23 in favor of Staples with 3:30 to go in the third quarter. Sophomore Marley Belzer contributed six points, while Smith had five points for the Wreckers, who visit FCIAC opponent Wilton on Tuesday.

“We came into this knowing we had two tough road games, at Greenwich and at Wilton,” Fabian said. “They were both above us in the standings. Our goal was to take these two games to get back above those games. Hopefully we can go to Wilton and play as good defensively as we did tonight.”

“Greenwich is a great team, they’ve had some great wins this year,” Fabian added. “Some nights it doesn’t fall, they didn’t have a great shooting night, sometimes it happens and that’s happened to us as well.”

Greenwich got seven points from Baxendale, four points from sophomore guard Anna Lenschow and a point apiece from senior forward Riana Xhekaj and Davenport.

The Cardinals visit Trumbull on Tuesday, then travel to Danbury on Friday.

“Despite all that happened to us, we tried to keep up,” said Wax, who noted the team will bring up a player or two from the junior varsity squad for future varsity games due to injuries.

“They will be ready for it,” she said. “People will rise to the occasion.”