Riding momentum to statement victory
Mustangs use early 27-3 run to upset Howard County’s top team
For 10 minutes on Thursday night against seventh-ranked Oakland Mills, Marriotts Ridge played as close to flawless basketball as a team possibly can.
The Mustangs got stops on the defensive end, rebounded and made tough shots all over the floor. The result was an extended 27-3 run between the end of the second quarter and the majority of the third that turned a nine-point deficit into a 17-point lead, setting the stage for a statement 56-46 victory over the top team in Howard County.
“Everything we’ve been trying to execute throughout this season, it all came together during that stretch. Baskets that usually rim out, were falling. Balls that usually bounce away, we were grabbing … and the biggest thing was we made stop after stop on defense,” said Marriotts Ridge coach Sarah Miller, whose team had lost against Oakland Mills, 52-32, in early January.
“We’ve been waiting a long time for that to happen and all of a sudden everything just finally clicked.”
Emma Morath led the way with a career-high 21 points to go along with 13 rebounds for a Marriotts Ridge (8-11, 6-7 Howard County) team that earned its second victory in as many nights.
Morath said that the momentum the team established by defeating Hammond, 48-43, a day earlier definitely carried over.
“I think going into this game we were really hoping for a win, especially [after] last night’s game that we pulled out a nice victory. I think that we had good team morale at that point,” she said. “We had a left in that third quarter that Oakland Mills positive mindset and were really pumped scored its first points of the half courtesy of going into it.” a foul shot from Riggs.
Mallory Conroy added 10 points for the Coming off a Hammond game where Mustangs, who made nine shots from the her team had allowed the Golden Bears to foul line in the final seven minutes to help open the second half on a 12-2 run, Miller hold off a fourth-quarter push by the said there was a lot of emphasis placed on Scorpions. being the aggressor this time around.
Oakland Mills (15-3, 11-3) got as close as “We came in, were super focused and six points with 4:54 remaining in regulatalked a lot about energy and coming out in tion, but Marriotts Ridge buckled down that second half fired up,” Miller said. “For from there to re-extend its lead. us, it was taking what happened yesterday
In the early stages it was Aislynn Riggs early in that second half and figuring out (15 points) and Marley Grenway (11 points) what we needed to do in order for that not that did the heavy lifting offensively for the to happen again. And I think our girls Scorpions en route to building a 25-16 learned from that because they were advantage with 3:39 remaining in the excited and they were ready.” opening half. But once Marriotts Ridge The back-to-back county wins are a first grabbed the momentum, it didn’t let it go this season for Marriotts Ridge and the until it had built an insurmountable team will try to keep things going on cushion. Friday against Glenelg. On the other side,
“In the end, they were able to sustain 32 the loss drops Oakland Mills a game minutes of what they do best, while we behind Long Reach (12-2, 12-4) in the were only able to put together 16 to 20 county standings. minutes. Some of those things we have The Scorpions are now tied with
Howard with two county contests remainmaybe gotten away with at times this
ing. season, tonight they exploited them,”
With a game against Hammond on tap Oakland Mills coach Walt Hagins said. “By today, Hagins said his girls have to have a the time we finally made adjustments to short memory. the way they were pounding it inside and “It doesn’t get any easier, that’s for sure,” cutting to the basket, we were in too big of he said. “That’s going to be a hungry a hole.” Hammond team. So we have less than 24
Marriotts Ridge’s run to close the hours to go home, regroup and play second quarter ended up being 11-1 over a basketball.” span of three minutes to send the team into the break up by one point, 27-26. That strong play spilled right over into the third quarter, with the Mustangs scoring the first 16 points of the period.
It wasn’t until there was just 37 seconds