BUTLER TWP — North Allegheny came into Butler High School rolling toward a section title.

The Golden Tornado couldn't find a way to stop the momentum.

The Tigers outscored Butler 14-2 in the fourth quarter Thursday night to seal a 48-27 Section 3-AAAA girls basketball victory.

It marked the 11th straight win for North Allegheny (14-2, 8-1), while Butler fell to 8-9 overall and 4-3 in section play.

The Tigers swarmed Butler leading scorer Mackenzie O'Donnell in the post, forcing the Tornado to generate offense elsewhere.

“We knew they were pretty much going to try to take Mack out of it and they were sending three girls (to defend her),” Butler coach Dorothea Epps explained. “We needed the other girls to step up and be players, hit some shots.”

Cait Baxter answered the challenge early and tallied Butler's first eight points to keep the Tornado afloat, but there wasn't enough help to counter the Tigers' balanced attack.

Meg Morningstar led North Allegheny with 10 points and the Tigers — who shot 44.4 percent from the floor — had five players record at least seven points.

Baxter also finished with 10 points, but the Tornado shot just 26.5 percent from the field and only four players scored all game.

“It just wasn't a good shooting performance,” said Epps. “Cait came out and did a nice job of trying to keep us in it, but you can't play 2-on-5. Other girls have to be able to hit shots.”

North Allegheny expected its defense to be the difference.

“In order to win on the road, we have to defend,” said NA coach Sherri McConnell. “We did a nice job as a team defending together, trusting each other to have help, putting some good ball pressure on the guards and that frustrated them a little bit.”

The Tigers led 11-5 after the first quarter, but Butler cut the deficit to 13-10 on a Baxter 3-pointer and two free throws from O'Donnell with 4:53 to go in the second.

North Allegheny called timeout and responded with an 11-3 run to end the half, seizing a 24-13 halftime advantage.

“Defensively, I thought we played pretty well,” said Epps, “but we turned the ball over 12 times in the first half and you can't do that against really good teams because they're going to capitalize on it.”

“It's extremely important, especially when you're on the road, to have a little bit of a cushion like that,” said McConnell. “We knew Butler wanted this game and they weren't going to go away.”

Back-to-back 3-pointers from Natalie Barkus trimmed the NA lead to 27-21 in the third, but the Tornado still trailed 34-25 entering the final frame and the Tigers' advantage quickly bloated to 20 points.

“This was a tough game and we've focused on competitive toughness and also conditioning,” said McConnell. “That advantage in the second quarter, fourth quarter — that's hopefully showing that we're wearing teams down.”

Epps admitted attempting to climb out of the early hole took a toll.

“It just tires them out,” she said. “We're not very deep and that's why we can't afford to get down that many.”

Taylor Lake dished out a game-high four assists and Abby Gonzales grabbed a game-high nine rebounds for North Allegheny.

Barkus had nine points for Butler, while O'Donnell chipped in six. Sam Marak pulled down a team-high nine rebounds and Baxter distributed three assists.

NORTH ALLEGHENY 48

Maddie Nellis 3-6 0-0 7, Taylor Brennan 1-7 5-6 8, Meg Morningstar 5-6 0-0 10, Taylor Lake 1-2 2-2 4, Abby Gonzales 3-6 1-2 8, Devvin LaBarge 2-7 3-4 8, Danielle Wall 1-2 1-2 3. Totals: 16-36 12-16 48.

BUTLER 27

Cait Baxter 4-9 0-2 10, Sam Marak 1-4 0-0 2, Mackenzie O'Donnell 1-4 4-6 6, Natalie Barkus 3-8 0-0 9, Kalynn Callihan 0-3 0-0 0, Alyssa DiPippa 0-3 0-0 0, Morgan Pfabe 0-3 0-0 0, Leah Murphy 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 9-34 4-8 27.

North Allegheny 11 13 10 14—48

Butler5 8 12 2—27

3-point goals: North Allegheny 4-12 (Nellis 1-2, Gonzales 1-2, Brennan 1-4, LaBarge 1-4); Butler 5-14 (Barkus 3-5, Baxter 2-3, Callihan 0-3, Marak 0-1, DiPippa 0-1, Pfabe 0-1).

JV: Butler 45, North Allegheny 44 (B: DiPippa 19, Lauren Bresnahan 9; NA: Adams 9, Dallier 9).

Saturday: Oakland Catholic at Butler, 1 p.m.