Mette, Puccetti lead Northmen past Davies Tech
NORTH SMITHFIELD — After three meetings in less than three months, one thing has become perfectly clear – the talented North Smithfield girls basketball team is a bad match-up for Davies Tech.
While the Patriots beat elite D-III teams like Mt. Hope and Lincoln and pushed firstplace Burrillville to the final buzzer, they simply haven’t had any answers for Skylar Mette, Calla Puccetti and the Northmen.
After an Injury Fund defeat and a blowout loss in the Smithfield Boosters Tournament over Christmas, the Patriots found themselves trailing by 16 points at halftime of Thursday’s lone league meeting. Thanks to the play of Keeara Howard and Anna Gomes, the Patriots closed the gap to eight with nine minutes to go, but the Northmen pulled away for a 55-38 victory at Lovett Gymnasium.
“They’re a tough match-up for us because they have size – which they utilize – they have shooters and they have speed,” Davies coach Joe Handy said. “If you try to take something away from them they go to something else, which happened in the first half when we didn’t play well. In the second half we found a couple of holes and took advantage of it. Keeara is capable of doing that every game.”
North Smithfield (12-2 Division III) is likely locked into the No. 2 seed unless Burrillville loses two of its final three games.
The Northmen, who own the tiebreaker with two-loss Tolman thanks to a buzzer-beater victory, received a team-high 15 points from Puccetti, while Mette was 7-of-10 from the foul line to finish with 13. Sophomore Laura Matchett added 12 points.
The Northmen only led by eight with six minutes to go when Davies guard Paola Hernandez raced to the hoop. The Patriot missed the close-range and on the other end Matchett scored on a second-chance opportunity to stretch the lead out to 10. Mette iced the game with eight points in the final four minutes to help the Northmen beat the Patriots by double digits for the third time.
“Davies had just won six games in a row, they’re skilled, they’re well coached and they were coming here with tons of energy,” North Smithfield coach Ariana Stanton said. “We played really good defense in the first half and we talked about how to handle Jenny in the paint and guard the perimeter. Honestly, we played tough.”
Davies (7-7 Division III) struggled from the field and the foul line in the first half, as Howard scored 10 of her team’s 15 points. Howard finished the night with a game-high 16 points, while Gomes scored all 10 of her points in the second half. Jenny Cruz added seven points, but she was just 1-of-8 from the foul line.
The Patriots trailed 31-15 at the break, but baskets from Howard and Gomes helped the visitor’s make it a 38-30 game with 9:07 remaining.
“We just spread the floor open a
little
bit and we got away with doing that for a while to get it down to eight,” Handy said. “We kept it eight for a while. We struggled with our foul shooting, which hurt us.”
Following a timeout after another Davies hoop made it an eight-point game, Stanton drew up a play for Puccetti on the left wing. The sophomore took a pass from Mette and buried the jumper to stretch the lead out to 10. The sophomore made another hoop minutes later as the Northmen began to pull away.
“We designed that play for Calla in the corner,” Stanton said. “We wanted to show them something different. We went with our same offensive principles but we shoved Calla in the corner and that made [Howard] decide whether she wanted to be on Skylar or on Calla and it worked.”
While the Northmen close out the home portion of the schedule Wednesday against struggling Lincoln School, the Patriots look to snap a two-game losing skid Monday evening when Pilgrim comes to Gaskin Alumni Hall.
SAINTS PULL AWAY FROM ROGERS
NEWPORT — St. Raphael guard Chloe Rayko knocked down back-to-back 3-pointers late in the second half to help the Saints pull away from pesky Rogers Thursday night. Junior center Amaya Dowdy scored 21 points and pulled down eight rebounds to lead the Saints to a 53-38 Division I victory.
“We were only up four when Chloe hit those 3-pointers and then we went full-court man-to-man against them,” SRA coach Tammy Drape said. “You have to give Rogers credit because they came to play and shot the ball better than we did.”
St. Raphael (13-2 Division I) returns Alumni Hall Monday to take on Bay View.
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CLIPPERS WIN EIGHTH STRAIGHT
NORTH PROVIDENCE – The Cumberland High girls basketball was tested in the early going of Thursday night’s Division II contest as North Providence jumped out to a six-point lead.
Some hot shooting from Molly Rebelo turned the tide in the Clippers’ favor along with hoops from Madison Zancan and Abby LaRose as Cumberland regrouped to post a convincing 60-44 win. It was the ninth straight win for the Clippers, now 11-3 in league play.
Rebello led Cumberland (11-3 Division II) with 13 points while Zancan and Abby Vallely each netted 12 points.
CUMBERLAND (60): Madison Zancan 5 2-2 12, Molly Rebelo 5 0-0 13, Morgan Vinacco 1 0-0 2, Abby LaRose 3 0-0 6, Juliette Vemmer 2 2-2 6, Lily LaChance 1 1-2 3, Abby Vallely 5 0-0 12, Bella Luca 2 0-0 6, Shannon Raftery 0 0-0 0, Alexandra Jakubiak, Megan Cotter 0 0-0 0. Totals: 24 5-6 60.
NORTH PROVIDENCE (44): Alena Rizzo 5 1-4 13, Raffaella Brunetti 2 0-0 5, Karissa Sherman 2 2-4 6, Stephanie Saucier 4 3-4 11, Gionna D’Ovidio 3 2-2 9. Totals: 16 8-14 44. Three-point field goals: C 7 (Rebelo 2, Vallely 2, Bella Luca 2); NP 4 (Alena Rizzo 2, Raffaella Brunetti, Gionna D’Ovidio).