Davies’ size wears down Northmen
LINCOLN — For the first eight minutes of Wednesday night's Division III-North Blackstone Valley clash with Davies Tech, the North Smithfield girls basketball team executed everything coach Ariana Stanton talked about in the practices leading up to the game.
The Northmen, behind the play of Alexis DeSimone, Julia Dias and Skylar Mette, moved the ball around the bigger Patriots to grab a two-point advantage midway through the first half.
And then Davies coach Joe Handy decided to play his trump card. The Patriots essentially went to a three-center lineup which the Northmen simply had no answer for. The combination of Jenny Cruz (10 points), Thalia Philippe (seven points) and Destiny Baptiste dominated the rest of the half.
Junior guard Julie Desautel scored a gamehigh 15 points and the Patriots overcame a five-point deficit early in the contest to earn a 45-33 victory at Gaskin Alumni Hall.
“We went big on them,” Handy said. “I wanted to go big on them and I wanted to get the big girls more involved in the game. We wanted to control the boards and that was the key. I was going to start the bigs, but I didn't do it. I knew I was going to go to them at some point. We still have a lot of work to do. We're still making way too many mistakes.”
“Early in the game we were moving the ball, finding the open spots and hitting shots,” Stanton said. “It sounds simple, but then we started panicking. We stopped driving into the paint, we stopped reversing the ball and our shots weren't falling. We prepared for this and we didn't do what we prepared for, which is tough.”
Davies Tech (4-2 Division III-North) climbed out of last place in the very competitive four-team subdivision thanks to the rebounds of the centers and the scoring of the guards. Point guard Sam Baako chipped in with nine points.
As happy as he was that his team bounced back from Monday's defeat to Burrillville, Handy was still disappointed with the way his squad handled the ball. While North Smithfield only committed 14 turnovers, the Patriots committed 27.
“That's the norm for us,” Handy said. “A lot of the turnovers are travels because the girls get caught up and they’re indecisive. We want them to penetrate in the paint and make things happen. I know we're going to turn the ball over and we just have to make sure we're doing everything else right.”
North Smithfield (3-2 Division III-North) knows life won't get any easier because the Northmen head to the Broncodome tomorrow night to play in the first of two Stanton Bowls. Ariana Stanton's sister, Sam, is the coach of the Broncos.
Ariana Stanton hopes her team can start Friday's game the way they started Wednesday's contest. Ferland knocked down a pair of jumpers in the opening three minutes to give the Northmen a 6-1 advantage. Davies answered with 9-3 run, which was punctuated by a Desautel 3-pointer.
The Northmen regained the lead on an Alexis DeSimone 3-pointer, but then the Patriots went on an 18-7 run over the final eight minutes of the half to grab a nine-point halftime advantage. Senior guard Celeste Gambardella's four first-half fouls really hurt the flow of the Northmen's offense.
“We prepared for their [centers], so we knew what we had to do and we knew how we needed to rebound,” Stanton said. “We had a gameplan and we didn't execute it. We focused on specific matchups, but we just didn't rebound.”
Baako extended the lead to double digits a minute into a second half that featured 19 turnovers and plenty of missed shots. While the second half wasn’t pretty for Handy to watch, he was pleased that his squad took a step forward against a division rival.
Gambardella ended up scoring all four of her points in the second half, while the Broncos also received buckets from Mette and Madison Wholey in the second half.
“There’s a lot of things I do like right now,” Handy said. “Our girls are tenacious on the boards and we’re getting putbacks. I think Jenny Cruz has been phenomenal for us. Her drop step [in the post] is really good and she’s as strong as house. Our gameplan was to work inside-out this year. If we utilize the inside game, that should open things up for our shooters.”
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