A TOUGH DAY
WPIAL champs couldn’t contain Mount Carmel’s 1-2 punch in paint
Both WPIAL teams that played Thursday, the Neshannock and Mohawk girls, lost PIAA championship games. Neshannock’s Mairan Haggerty, above left, can’t contain the tears.
HERSHEY, Pa. — If there is an art to winning a state championship, then the Mount Carmel girls figured it out and used a paint job to complete the picture.
A young Neshannock team, which started three sophomores and two juniors, couldn’t stand up to Mount Carmel’s big girls Thursday, and the WPIAL champions lost to Mount Carmel, 54-43, in the PIAA Class 2A title game at Giant Center. Neither team had ever played in a state championship.
The difference in the game: Mount Carmel (19-5) pulled an inside job, and Neshannock (19-3) couldn’t shoot straight. Mount Carmel scored 30 points in the paint, and 6-foot-3 senior Dani Rae Renno and 5-10 sophomore Alyssa Reisinger were a 1-2 wrecking crew. Renno scored 24 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, while Reisinger came off the bench to score 11 points and grab 5 rebounds.
Meanwhile, Neshannock was as cold as the hockey ice under the court at Giant Center. The Lancers shot a whopping 35 3-pointers. They made only five, which comes to 14%.
“I think our girls came in and executed the game plan very well,” Mount Carmel coach Lisa Varano said. “We knew [Neshannock] was going to shoot a lot from the outside. If you live and die by that, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. We knew they couldn’t contain both Dani and Alyssa in the paint.”
Sophomore guard Mairan Haggerty led Neshannock with 12 points. Junior guard Neleh Nogay had 11, and junior guard Addilae Watts added 10. But the three were a combined 13 of 44 from the field and 5 of 26 from behind the arc.
“That’s a good team we played,” Neshannock coach Luann Grybowski said. “They have everything. They have a good point guard, two nice kids in the post, two good guards — and we didn’t shoot the ball well.”
Renno was also a factor on defense as a rim protector. Although Mount Carmel played man-to-man, Renno never left the paint.
“Trying to go over a 6-2 or 6-3 player is much different than we saw all year,” Grybowski said. “That took away [point guard] Neleh’s attack and took her out of her game. Then, if we don’t have a couple kids hit shots, ... ”
Renno, an Elizabethtown College recruit who averages 21 points and 12 rebounds, had double vision in the first half. Neshannock played a zone and put two players on Renno wherever she went, a strategy Varano said Mount Carmel saw often this season. So, Reisinger came off the bench and scored all 11 of her points in the first two quarters.
Mount Carmel, a team from the coal region in Eastern Pennsylvania, took a 17-8 lead in the second quarter and was ahead, 2721, at halftime. Mount Carmel led by 4332 after three quarters and opened up a 49-35 edge in the fourth. Neshannock changed its defensive strategy in the second half. The Lancers stopped doubling Renno as much and put on a full-court press. Neshannock forced nine Mount Carmel turnovers in the fourth quarter and started to mount a comeback.
“My game plan was if we hold [Renno] to around 10 points, then we do our job,” Grybowski said. “But [Reisinger] lit it up, and they hit a couple of big shots. But all in all, I’m so proud of my kids because they never gave up and they made that run. In hindsight, I should’ve probably played a little bit more man-to-man, full court.”
Neshannock’s press was effective, and the Lancers made things interesting when Nogay’s basket brought the Lancers within 49-43 with 1:08 left. But Reisinger made one free throw and missed the second before Reno rebounded it and scored to make it 52-43. That doomed the Lancers’ hopes of a comeback. But Neshannock wasn’t all that dejected after the game. Maybe it’s because all five starters will return. Or maybe it’s because the season was still an unforgettable one.
“It was magical,” Grybowski said. “It was the next best thing to the birth of my daughter, and I really mean that. The kids are great kids. I love coaching them, and they play hard. What more can you ask for? “I told them I don’t want to see any tears. I told them, ‘You’ve won games you weren’t supposed to win all the way through. Somebody beats you, then you need to be gracious and accept second place. You don’t have to like it, but you have to accept it.’ ”