The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Avon Lake earns key girls basketball victory
The Shoregals toppled Amherst, 48-38, to maintain pace in the Southwestern Conference. Also, get up to date on the wrestling leaders from the area.
It was the gritty, classic Southwestern Conference matchup that both sides have come to expect as Amherst traveled to Avon Lake with a leg up in the conference standings on the line on Jan. 9.
The Comets overcame a slow start to scare the Shoregals, but ran out of steam as Avon Lake was able to finish off Amherst, 48-38.
The Shoregals’ finish was as crucial as the start because Amherst surged before and after half.
“Credit to our girls, they came out in the first half and came out with a good intensity and what have you,” Avon Lake head coach Dave Zvara said. “Amherst is a good team, so they’re going to make a run and they definitely made a run in the third quarter, but again credit to our girls, after they made that run, we still kept our composure and didn’t put our heads down and was able to hang onto it.”
Amherst was able to
cut the Avon Lake lead before the break down to 27-19 to bring some momentum into the locker room.
“When we went in at halftime, our adjustment was to pound the ball, pound the ball, pound the ball,” first-year Amherst head coach Jay Valadez said. “Try to pick up full court to try to speed it up just a little bit, I don’t mind the slow down game, but that’s not how we play. So, if we’re going to slow it down, the object was to pound it inside and go two buckets at a time and we tied it up.
Keeping the Shoregals without a field goal until the 3:05 mark of the third quarter, the Comets capitalized on the scoring drought to tie the score at 28-28 thanks to a plethora of turnovers.
“No (we haven’t seen those struggles on offense) in a long time, in fact, it’s probably my fault because I’ve been telling them we’ve been handling the ball pretty good,” Zvara said. “Our turnover percentage has been real good, so that was probably one of our worse ones and credit to their defense, they got a little aggressive on us.”
With the game tied up, Avon Lake turned to the one consistent scorer on the night in senior Arianna Negron, who finished with a game-high 21 points and kept her head up on a night where support was harder to come by.
“I think I had a lot of confidence going out there,” Negron said. “I know that I needed to not get discouraged, so if I did miss a bucket, I couldn’t get down on myself.”
The Shoregals’ defense was as sharp as ever in shutting down one of the top scorers in the county in Comets’ senior and Georgia State commit, Kamryn Dziak, who scored eight points.
“I think our rotation really helps that,” Avon Lake senior Allie Heschel said. “We know obviously we have to shut down Dziak and all their shooters, we just rotate and we know who their shooters are.”
Shutting down one more push from the Amherst offense, Negron was clutch down the stretch scoring 10 of her 21 points in the fourth quarter to close out the Comets’ threat and get a big win with the SWC title up in the air.
“We wanted this game really bad and we know usually when we have our heads down, the game starts to turn around and we start to mess things up defensively and so we all just kept our heads up and played well,” Negron said, “This game meant a lot and now other teams are looking at us and they’re thinking that we’re more of a threat to them, so they’re always going to keep their eyes out for us.”
Earning the meaningful win was a confidence boost for Zvara and his squad. But as he told his team, this Amherst team maybe another one they tussle with come tournament time. Knowing his team came out on top thanks to the will to win, Zvara knows his team has something even he can’t coach.
“In the third quarter, we could have put our heads down and they came out and got a little intensity,” Zvara said. “They have the will to win, it takes a lot of heart. You can coach all you want, but if it doesn’t come from here, there’s nothing I can do.”