Skippers fall in Final Four to eventual state champs
SOUTH KINGSTOWN – During pregame warmups on Saturday at the Ryan Center, every North Kingstown player wore a warmup shirt with the number 15 and the name “Kalin” on the back. It was to show support to teammate Shea Kalin who will undergo knee surgery in April for an injury she sustained on March 3 in the Division I semifinal round.
With Kalin on the bench against Moses Brown in their girls basketball state Final Four matchup, the Skippers lacked the firepower that got them to their 16-2 record and No. 2 seed in the tournament. NK’s season ended with a 50-44 loss as the D-II Quakers advanced to the state championship.
“[Kalin] is a piece of the puzzle,” head coach Bob Simeone said. “Losing her hurt us. It does take away a 3-point threat and she’s very good from the free-throw line. It does have a little bit of an impact, but that’s why we have the mentality for next person up.”
Even if Kalin played, Moses Brown might have won anyway. The problem for the Skippers wasn’t offense – it was defense. NK beat La Salle in the previous playoff round with the same amount of points they scored on Saturday – 44 – but Moses Brown figured out a strategy of attacking NK’s players to wear them out and get them in foul trouble. The Quakers saved their best quarter for last and the Skippers couldn’t play aggressive enough defense as three of their starters played the final quarter with four fouls.
Moses Brown’s star sophomore, Lauren Bousquet, seemed to be on a mission throughout and wouldn’t have let the Quakers lose. She willed Moses Brown through a slow start and carried them into that dominant fourth quarter where they outscored NK 19-13. Bousquet scored 26 points in the game on 11-for-21 shooting from the field. She led the Quakers to the state championship the next day where they blew D-I champion Barrington off the court.
Additionally, NK did actually replace Kalin’s production on Saturday as best as they could. Kalin’s direct replacement in the starting lineup, Finola Gately, played maybe the best game of any Skipper. Against Moses Brown, Gately scored 13 points and hit three 3-pointers, two of which came during a big stretch in the third quarter where the score went back and forth. As a freshman bench piece for the whole season, Gately joined the regular rotation after Kalin went down in the D-I semifinals and showed lots of promise as a sharpshooter.
“Watch out for next year,” Simeone said. “I thought Finola stepped in so well for the last couple of games. She was next in the rotation. We felt she was the best piece to come help because we needed someone to hit shots, and she was hitting shots.”
Gately scored the first NK basket on Saturday, on the way to a 10-5 lead after the first quarter. The Quakers turned the ball over eight times in the quarter and it looked like the Skippers’ defense had things figured out. They even nearly forced back-to-back 10-second violations – the first was saved by a Moses Brown timeout.
Everything shifted when the second quarter started. The Quakers made two and-one layups in the first minute and the Skippers didn’t score a single point for the first six and a half minutes of the quarter. NK finally broke through when Brooke Faunce made a 3-pointer, but not before Moses Brown took a 16-10 lead. The Quakers took an 18-16 lead into halftime.
The second quarter looked very similar to the one in NK’s loss to Barrington in the Division I title game where the
Skippers didn’t score a single point the whole time.
“Again we went dry in the second quarter,” Simeone said. “You just can’t win these big games while missing little bunny shots, backdoor layups, offensive rebound putbacks – you can’t win the big games like that.”
The Skippers started hitting their easy chances when the second half started. Jaelyn Holmes, who had a slow first half, came out on fire in the second half by scoring six straight points, followed by a pair of 3-pointers by Gately. Moses Brown matched the energy though, and the teams took a 3131 tie into the final quarter.
Holmes tied the game at 35 with seven minutes left by making a layup, but Bousquet made an and-one layup with just over five minutes left to retake the lead. From there, the Quakers slowly added to the advantage. The Skippers had it to within six points with 57 seconds left, but the Quakers made four of their next six free throws to put the game out of reach.
“They hit more shots than we did,” Simeone said. “That’s a good team. The big kid, [Bousquet], she’s strong and she can finish. They played well.”
Over the course of the fourth quarter, Faunce and Holmes reached four fouls, while Maya Bigelli fouled out by reaching five. All three of them excel at generating steals – part of how they forced Moses Brown into 22 turnovers – but they couldn’t go for steals while in foul trouble which allowed for a much more relaxed playstyle by the Quakers.
Holmes scored a Skipper-high 16 points and also added six steals on the defensive end. Gately added 13 points, Bigelli added seven and Erin Hanrahan added three. Faunce scored only five points, which was noticeably under her season average.
Faunce is a player who showed a clear ability to take over as a star-level scorer and did so in a few big games this year, including when she scored 29 to lead NK to a tough late-season win over Cranston West. When she’s on, she can carry the team, but the Skippers couldn’t overcome her shooting struggles against Barrington and Moses Brown, both of which were played in big arenas. In general, playoff experience is a big factor to championship teams, so this would ideally serve as an experience that certain players might need before they can become champions.
The main storyline with this Skipper team is that they were a young squad completely overachieving based on the fact that they’re made up of mostly freshmen and sophomores with no seniors on the roster. Now, rather than the average age being an obstacle, it’ll turn into a strength. As long as nobody leaves for prep school, the team will look exactly the same but with each player given an added year of development. They’ll look to build on a year where they finished as the runners-up in D-I and reached 3rd/4th place in the state.
“Certain pieces have got to be mentally tough – that’s what we’re going to work on,” Simeone said. “I told them in the locker room to be proud of a great season. You can’t be disappointed. I couldn’t be more happy with the season as a coach, loving coming to practice every day with this group, working hard. I don’t think anyone expected us to be here, as I’ve said now four or five times.”