It was a type of adversity the New Castle girls' basketball team rarely faced the past three months, and it couldn't have come at a more inopportune time.

The favorite to win WPIAL Class AAA championship yesterday, the Red Hurricane faced an double-digit, second-quarter deficit, a shocking occurrence considering it had won its first three playoff games by an average of 35 points.

But shortly after New Castle coach Luann Grybowski looked at an assistant coach and said, "What do we do?" her team had an emphatic answer.

Spurred by a late first-half surge, top-seeded New Castle rallied for a 54-47 victory against West Mifflin at Palumbo Center. It's the second WPIAL title in the past three seasons for New Castle, which captured the Class AAAA title in 2007 before moving down in classification this season.

For most of the first half against an athletic West Mifflin (19-7) team which also lost in the final last season, New Castle (24-2) was outclassed, falling behind the Titans, 26-13, a few minutes into the second quarter. But then something clicked.

New Castle went on to outscore West Mifflin, 19-6, to tie the score at the half, a run that included a 8-0 spurt in the final 1:36 sparked by two 3-pointers from Shelby Rodgers.

That served as a springboard to an impressive second half.

"That's kind of been the character for this team," said Grybowski, who won her third title at the school. "They feel like they can win under any circumstances. They just believe in each other and themselves."

A belief exemplified by the play of sophomore forward LaShauna Brothers, who, after scoring 15 points in the first half, was visibly sick in a hallway outside the New Castle locker room at halftime. Then, to make matters worse, Brothers was forced to sit for more than nine minutes in the second half after she picked up her fourth foul.

As she sat, however, her team played even with the Titans. And, when she came back with 5:08 remaining in the fourth quarter, she soon made the game's biggest basket. Brothers' strong 4-foot runner amid a slew of West Mifflindefenders went down, putting New Castle ahead for good, 48-47, with 2:45 remaining. The Titans turned the ball over eight times in the fourth quarter.

Brothers finished with a game-high 19 points, making 8 of 10 from the field. Teammate JaNia McPhatter added 10.

"We underestimated her," West Mifflin coach Phil Shar said of Brothers. "We really concentrated on [Rodgers] and [Kaylynn Waters]. We thought our big people could handle [Brothers], but she was pretty good today."

West Mifflin was led by junior forward Jessica Pitts, who scored 16 points. Freshman Jayla Leftwich chipped in with 10.

Only four of their combined total came in the second half, though, a product of New Castle switching from a man-to-man to a zone defense.

Not to mention switching back to the standout play New Castle displayed all season. And the Red Hurricane did it when they needed it most last night.