MAAC to allow limited attendance in AC
The Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference will allow a limited number of and at its tournament in Atlantic City from March 8-13.
The league made the announcement on Friday, citing New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy’s executive order allowing indoor venues to have up to 10% capacity.
Fans in attendance will be limited to friends and family of the basketball programs, the MAAC said in its statement. Event capacity will include all participants, essential staff and family members of each participating team’s student-athletes and coaches. All attendees must wear face coverings and physically distance.
“It is great that the recent executive order lifting attendance limits in athletic venues will allow us to accommodate a limited number of ‘Friend and Families’ of the teams, particularly the parents, siblings and children of the student-athletes and the coaching staffs,” MAAC Commissioner Rich Ensor said. “This is a significant first step in the return to athletic competition in New Jersey and the MAAC membership is pleased to be the first event in Boardwalk Hall since last March when the pandemic abruptly shut down March Madness.”
The MAAC Tournament tips off on Monday, March 8 at Boardwalk Hall and runs through March 13. The championship games will be contested on Saturday, March 13, with the women’s final at 11 a.m. on ESPNews and the men’s final at 4 p.m. on ESPNU.
Franki Gomez is closing out her career with the Hopewell Valley High varsity girls’ basketball team in style this winter.
Gomez, a 5-foot-6 senior guard headed off to play Division III basketball at the University of Rochester in New York next year, has led the Colonial Valley Conference in scoring throughout the coronavirus pandemic-shortened, 2021 season.
In her two home games this week, she has shown the pace, shooting touch and all-around game which got her recognized as one of the best players to come out of this area in 2021.
With her team still trying to get a better position in the upcoming CVC Championship pods, Gomez gave Hightstown headaches Friday night as she relentlessly ran around boxand-one defense with which the Rams tried to contain her.
The result was a 55-31 win for Hopewell with Gomez leading all scorers with 19 points. She rounded out her stats with seven rebounds, six steals, four assists and a blocked shot.
“I’m trying to have as much fun as I can this season,” Gomez said. “It was hard to play over the summer. I feel really fortunate that we are getting the chance to play now. There are others who are not.”
The hard part of being the focal point of any offense is that other teams know to look for you and will do whatever they can to try to stop you. Gomez and her teammates have dealt with that this season.
It wasn’t until this week that head coach Coleen Ross’ Bulldogs were able to shake a sixgame losing streak and turn it into consecutive wins as the mini-postseason approaches.
“This was a good win for us,” Gomez said. “It really helped the way we played in
the beginning of the game. Everything was clicking.”
Hopewell Valley (5-6) set the tone for the game by scoring the first 19 points. It was not until Rams 5-foot-8 sophomore forward Megan McDonough hit a pair of free throws with 2.2 seconds left in the first quarter that the visitors got on the board.
During that opening charge, Gomez scored 11 of her points, while 5-11 sophomore forward Andie Cappucci added five of her 11 points.
Hightstown (7-3) played better in the second and fourth quarters, yet could not sustain their level of play.
“In tough losses like these, you have to learn from them,” said Megan McDonough, whose five points helped the Rams inside, while 6-3 freshman center Abby Misier scored 10 points and sophomore guard Kelly McAleer added eight points. “We just got Abby back (after missing five games). Our girls always work hard. Today we needed
to work together better.”
The Bulldogs used 6-1 freshman center Kennedy Havens and Cappucci to collapse inside on Misier. Havens focused on the defensive assignment and went on to lead the team with eight rebounds.
After Hightstown trimmed the deficit to 25-11 at intermission, Hopewell came back with a 19-6 surge in the third quarter to stymie the rally. Freshman guard Gillian Magner added nine points (six in the second half), and junior forward
Hailey Rowe hit for eight points (all in the third quarter) to add some balance to the Bulldogs’ charge.
Things do not figure to get much easier for head coach Jenna Marcus’ club Saturday when it visits 7-2 Robbinsville at 11 a.m.
Meanwhile, Gomez and classmates Acadia Kurtz and Lauren Morici are hoping to keep their remaining time together with the Bulldogs next week as special as possible.
HIGHTSTOWN >> Not every team is built to handle Hightstown’s unique style. The Rams like to bring fullcourt pressure, send double teams in the half court and stick as many 3-pointers down your throat as possible.
But Hopewell Valley was ready to embrace the challenge.
In a highly competitive and up-tempo CVC game Friday, the Bulldogs battled through eight lead changes in three quarters and then held off Hightstown with key free throws down the stretch for an impressive 77-69 upset win.
“It’s exhausting, but we’ve got to have good composure,” said senior Jake Loughery, who scored a career-high 28 points. “We knew coming in that they were going to play like that, and we knew if just we played our game, took it slow, took it play by play that we’d come out on top.”
Hopewell (4-5) showed it had the ingredients to play at Hightstown’s pace by going on a 17-5 run in the first quarter to grab an 11-point lead. Loughery dropped 12
points in the period and Kevin Ellis, who finished with 16 points, buried a 3-pointer from the wing just before the buzzer.
Hopewell prepared for Hightstown’s pressure on Thursday. Coach Matt Stein made it a light practice physically so that his players would have fresh legs coming off grueling games against Nottingham and Hamilton earlier in the week.
The Bulldogs succeeded with sound ball security and crisp passing as they weaved through the perimeter and the paint to find
open looks.
“Nobody else in the CVC plays this type of style, that Grinnell style,” coach Matt Stein said. “It was a lot of passing yesterday, a lot of trapping drills. We did this drill called ‘12 seconds’ where they’re getting smothered the whole time, fouling them and being strong with the ball.”
Hightstown (6-6) did cause a fair number of turnovers, but the Rams made fewer 3s than the Bulldogs (five versus seven), struggled at the foul line and (9-for-19) and were too frenetic when navigating
Hopewell’s rangy defense, which features five players who are at least 6-foot-2.
Hopewell also used its size to limit Hightstown’s second-chance opportunities by rebounding well. The Bulldogs then maximized their own chances at the other end of the floor in the crucial minutes after clinging to a 34-32 halftime lead.
“We were saying that we have to make sure every possession counts, don’t force anything and when we were breaking the press, to find the open man, just make the easy pass,” Loughery said. “Don’t try to do anything crazy.”
Loughery led by example as he calmly drilled 3s within a minute early in the fourth quarter, then stayed firm as he dribbled through Hightstown’s pressure and passed to Beckett Harrison to create a foul underneath the basket. Jackson Whitlock made two layups in transition after that to push Hopewell’s lead back to double digits and end with 14 points.
Loughery, a 6-foot-1 guard, has subtly been Hopewell’s most productive player over the last three years after learning on the bench from the Bulldogs’
21-win team in 2017.
“He’s a quiet guy, but he brings leadership and hustle,” Stein said. “He got to see other guys’ leadership and tried to step into that role that we needed this year. He does it by demonstration, not necessarily by verbal.”
Loughery said the seniors feel an added sense of urgency in this shortened season. By following up its overtime win against Hamilton with another strong performance, Hopewell is in position to make the second postseason pod when seedings are announced Saturday.
“We know that we didn’t start off too hot this year,” Loughery said. “Corona canceled two weeks of our season, and we knew that this is the final stretch. We’ve got four seniors starting and we just want to give it our all before it’s all over.”
HOPEWELL (77)
Whitlock 6-2-14, Loughery 10-5-28, Ellis 5-3-16, Harrison 3-0-6, Kuuskvere 1-0-2, Rodriguez 3-2-9, Sullivan 1-0-2. Totals — 29-12-77.
HIGHTSTOWN (69)
Cukkemane 5-3-15, Wersching 3-0-6, Minzie 1-1-3, Basse 5-2-14, Kenny 2-3-8, Eaves 3-0-6, Ahmed 6-0-12, Reiss 1-0-2, Feyas 2-0-4.
Totals —28-9-69.
Hopewell (4-5) 25 9 18 25 — 77 Hightstown (6-6) 14 18 17 20 — 69 3-point goals: Loughery 3, Ellis 3, Rodriguez (HV), Cukkemane 2, Basse 2, Kenny (H).