River Hill builds early lead, trips Oakland Mills
Hawks close in on top boys seed; Long Reach girls roll to win over South Carroll
A near flawless first half gave way to a rough third quarter for the River Hill boys basketball team, but in the end the Hawks made enough buckets in their halfcourt offense to earn a 58-53 home win over No. 15 Oakland Mills and avenge their one-point defeat to the Scorpions two months earlier.
After dropping three of its first four county games, River Hill (15-6, 10-5 Howard) is now in position to secure the No. 1 seed in the Class 2A South, Section I playoffs. The Hawks, Oakland Mills (15-5, 11-4) and Wilde Lake are all in contention to earn a first-round bye entering the final week of the regular season.
“A big spark is how we lost our first [county] game, 61-56 in overtime against Wilde Lake. That really gave us momentum” said Hawks sophomore Nick Marshall, who finished with13 points. “Losing to Hammond, we were able to come back and get revenge on them. Same with Oakland Mills, losing by one point at the end.
“We just wanted to get revenge and make a statement,” Marshall added. “Everyone is talking about howRiver Hill is not top, so we just want to show them, and that’s what we’re trying to do.”
NO. 4 BOYS’ LATIN 84, JOHN CARROLL 62: Cameron Spencer had a game-high 27 points and Jake Nichols had 23 points to lead the Lakers (29-5, 15-2 Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association A Conference Black Division) over the host Patriots (5-23, 3-13) in the regular-season finale.
ST. MARY’S 67, SEVERN 64, 2OT: The visiting Saints (6-16, 4-9 MIAA B Conference) forced both overtimes and beat the Admirals (13-11, 9-5). St. Mary’s led 66-64 with 10 seconds left in the second overtime.
GERSTELL 70, ARCHBISHOP CURLEY 66: Caleb Johnson had a game-high 27 points, but the visiting Friars (14-10, 10-5 MIAA B Conference) fell to the Falcons (18-13, 12-4). Gerstell, led by Jeremiah Stanton with 23 points, opened with a 22-8 run.
LOYOLA BLAKEFIELD 85, CALVERT HALL 69: Mitch Fischer (19 points) made a 3-pointer at the buzzer of the third quarter to give the host Dons (19-11, 12-6 MIAA A Conference Red Division) a 57-56 lead and Loyola held on to win the come-frombehind victory over the Cardinals (6-21, 2-13). The Cardinals made 13 3-pointers and led 39-36 at the half.
MEADE64, CHESAPEAKE-AA37: Mazhi Thames (26 points) scored his 1,000th career point to lead the visiting Mustangs (17-4) past the Cougars (6-15). Meade has won 17 games in the regular season for the seventh straight time.
Girls
NO. 6 LONG REACH 53, SOUTH CARROLL 36: Lyric Swann (25 points, 8 steals) and Jaelyn Swann (12 points, 4 steals) led the way for the Lightning (13-4) past the host Cavaliers (6-10). on Jalyn Richardson (9 points, 4 steals and 3 assists) also had a big game for Long Reach.
HAMMOND 70, NO. 7 OAKLAND MILLS 62: Nyelle Allen and Imani Reid scored 22 points apiece, helping the visiting Golden Bears (10-9, 6-8 Howard) rally from down four points in the fourth quarter to upset the Scorpions (15-4,11-4). It’s the second straight win and marks the first winning streak for the team in over a month.
“We needed this win in a big way. We’ve needed to learn to compete for 32 minutes and [tonight] we finally did that,” Hammond coach Ryan Hudy said. “Even down by four with five minutes left after being up almost the entire game, we didn’t panic, fought our tails off and finally broke through.”
NO. 9 OLD MILL 91, NORTHEAST 39: Sydney Faulcon tallied 22 points, 12 rebounds and four blocks and Briana White added 19 points, eight boards and three assists to lead the host Patriots (16 -4) to the win over the Eagles (11-9).
Destiny Galloway pitched in with 17 points, including five 3-pointers, Jaya Dews had 11 points, five steals and three assists, Mikiyah Mallett provided 10 points, four assist and three steals and Julia Bagnell handed out six assists for Old Mill stats.
Ryleigh Nalley had 13 points and Allyson Wills added nine for the Eagles.
NO. 13 CHESAPEAKE-AA 61, MEADE 57: The game was tied with 11 seconds left to play and the host Cougars (15-6) pulled out the win over the Mustangs (12-8). Morgan Gray had 16 points and 22 rebounds and got her 100th career block for Chesapeake. Corinne Castle and Haley Downin each scord 18 points for the Cougars. Meade was led by Destiny Jackson with 16 points and Symphonie Bryant-Brown with 15 points.
CENTENNIAL 45, WILDE LAKE 32: Tori Pearson scored a team-high 11 points for the Eagles (10-9, 6-8 Howard), who had eight different players score in the win over the host Wildecats (1-17, 0-14). Kalani Corkeron was the leading scorer for Wilde Lake with 11 points of her own.
NORTH COUNTY 41, GLEN BURNIE 38: Alicia Ennals had 16 points and 16 rebounds and Sam Biggs grabbed 15 rebounds in the visiting Knights’ win.
Aireona Holland had 10 rebounds and Na’Vaye Willis had six assists for North County (7-12).
CARROLL CHRISTIAN 50, HARFORD CHRISTIAN 13: The Patriots steamrollered the visiting Eagles and will take the top seed into next week’s Maryland Association of Christian Schools Athletic Conference tournament — looking to repeat as league champs and earn the program’s 10th title.
—Brent Kennedy,
Baltimore Sun Media Group —Pat Stoetzer,
Carroll County Times
Baltimore Sun staff contributed to this article.