McDonogh closes week with OT win over No. 6 Loyola Blakefield
After a week of quality work, the McDonogh boys basketball team was determined to finish strong Friday against visiting Loyola Blakefield.
The Eagles enjoyed a stunning upset road win over perennial power St. Frances on Wednesday and then built a 16-point lead midway through the third quarter against the No. 6 Dons.
When the advantage vanished — much quicker than it was built — the Eagles showed they had some resilience in them, too.
Guard Andrew Kasten forced overtime with a 3-pointer in the closing seconds and McDonogh took over in the extra four minutes, getting a massive 18-point, 19-rebound performance from junior forward Rob Fields to pull out a 67-62 win in front of a spirited, packed gym.
The Eagles, who also got 16 points from fellow junior Jeff Exinor, improved to 9-3 overall and 2-2 in league play. Loyola Blakefield, coming off a big home win against Mount Carmel on Wednesday, fell to 14-4 and 3-3 in league play.
“Tonight, everybody showed up and it was just a great win,” Fields said. “It was great to see how we handled that adversity in the third and fourth quarters. My man [Andrew Kasten] made a big shot and, in overtime, I think they had no idea what to do with us. So it was a great win, a great week.”
Behind sensational play from J’Lin Brown, who finished with 22 points and 10 rebounds before fouling out late in the fourth quarter, the Dons methodically chipped away at the lead. Brown scored 10 points in the comeback third, with his three-point play with 1:01 to go cutting the lead to 38-35.
After more from Brown, Mason Ellison (19 points, 10 boards) hit a 3-pointer with 5:01 left to give the visitors a 45-40 lead.
With 1:29 to play, a three-point play from Exinor tied the game at 52. The Dons answered with a basket from Sam Navarre to go up 54-52 with 27 seconds left. Then, after a stop on defense, Loyola got one free throw from Jordan Hammond to go up by three with 11 seconds to go in regulation.
It was more than enough time for Kasten to get situated at the left baseline and drain the clutch 3-pointer with three seconds left.
Without Brown, the Dons struggled offensively in overtime. Loyola didn’t get a field goal until Ellison hit a 3-pointer with 39 seconds left. By then, the Eagles had an inside basket from Fields and a big three from Ashton Kendall (12 points) to take hold of the game.
McDonogh coach Gerald Abrams applauded his team, citing the extra time spent in practice on situational play as a key down the stretch.
“Every loss we’ve had has been a one possession game in the fourth quarter with less than four minutes left, so to see this group bounce back and grow is a real level of maturity and I’m super proud of them,” he said.
Other boys basketball scores:
Parkville 69, Lansdowne 35: Parkville’s Mikko Persia hears the comparisons all of the time. He already knows the response.
“This is a completely different program,” Persia said. “We’re nothing like what we were last year, but we keep getting better.”
The Knights showed how much they’ve improved, beating visiting Lansdowne in a Baltimore County League game. Persia led all scorers with 25 points. Topaz Norris led the Vikings with 17 points.
Persia was referring to last year’s team on which he played, which won the Class 4A state championship. Parkville graduated a lot from that team and the head coach also moved on. Still, the Knights looked in mid-season form as they built an early first quarter lead and never looked back.
— Mike Frainie, For The Baltimore Sun
Catonsville 49, Dulaney 47: Catonsville junior Will Turner followed his own shot and scored the game-winner at the buzzer as the host Comets nipped Dulaney in a Friday night thriller.
Dulaney tied the score with nine seconds left on a 12-footer by Drew Ranck, who had a game-high 16 points, but Mike Owens (nine points, six rebounds, four steals) traversed through traffic with a behind-the-back dribble at half court and fired a two-handed strike to a cutting Turner, who hit the front of the rim with his first attempt before canning the sequel.
Turner’s shot dropped through the net with 0.2 seconds remaining and the scoreboard came unplugged and went dark for the third time in the second half. The mood was darker for a Dulaney squad that produced a frantic rally after trailing 46-35 with 4:19 remaining. — Craig Clary
Southern 70, Glen Burnie 69, 2OT: Nail biter, barn-burner, cliffhanger. Call it what you will, but Friday night’s clash between the Bulldogs and the Gophers had it all — and then a little bit extra.
But finally, after four quarters and a pair of overtime periods, Southern prevailed.
After engineering a comeback from down 12 in the fourth quarter, the Bulldogs (5-2) required a bit of a Houdini act with several defensive stops in the final 10 seconds after missed free throws and a turnover forced their backs against the wall.
Ethan Sheffey and Brian Griffin engineered Southern’s comeback. Sheffey notched 31 points and fueled the fourth-quarter frenzy, repeatedly getting to the basket and drawing fouls. He hit 10 free throws in the fourth quarter, none bigger than the last one that tied the game at 59 with under a minute left.
Griffin meanwhile, did most of his damage from behind the arc, delivering huge threes to swing the momentum back toward the visitors. In the second overtime, Griffin took over, scoring all seven of Southern’s points to secure the victory.
— Aidan Thomas, For Baltimore Sun Media
ManchesterValley60,Westminster40: Many would have doubts if someone said Manchester Valley would go on the road, only get three points from leading scorer Brendan Luddy, and still walk away with a 20-point victory.
Coach Chris Wunder would not be one of those people.
As Luddy battled double teams and a lower body injury he suffered in the first quarter, Colton Enderle stepped up big for the Mavericks, scoring 27 points off the bench as the Mavericks got one step closer to the top of the county.
— Timothy Dashiell
Joppatowne 57, Fallston 56
Patterson Mill 64, Havre de Grace 54 Gerstell 55, Chapelgate Christian 46 Liberty 57, Winters Mill 49
South River 60, Meade 53
Severn 65, Indian Creek 35
Archbishop Spalding 72, Boys’ Latin 66 Gilman 70, Glenelg Country 59
Mt. Hebron 64, Marriotts Ridge 48 River Hill 77, Centennial 65
Long Reach 64, Atholton 54
Oakland Mills 54, Glenelg 39
Girls basketball
Hammond 63, Reservoir 36: Hammond prides itself on its defense. The Golden Bears are one of Howard County’s tallest teams with junior center Sara Yarnell, senior power forward Asia Mitchell and senior guard Nia Green anchoring the lineup.
However, size can only take you so far. The Golden Bears have also featured consistent communication, which once again fueled their suffocating defense with 12 steals in a win over Reservoir.
Constant dialogue on the floor and playing with active hands have become foundational principles of the Golden Bears’ dominant start to the season. Hammond (10-0, 6-0 Howard County) is allowing a county-best 31.8 points per game, swarming opposing offenses and taking them out of rhythm.
Green spearheaded the effort Friday with a team-high 28 points and 10 steals, including an early third-quarter sequence where she grabbed steals on three straight possessions.
— Jacob Steinberg St. Mary’s 54, Mercy 47:
A smile consumed St. Mary’s senior Baily Walden’s face when she whipped the basketball out of a Mercy player’s hands and held it.
She couldn’t have devised a better night herself. Somehow, her 1,000-point milestone — something that was far from guaranteed considering she lost a normal freshman year to the pandemic — had lined up with the foreplaned celebration of her beloved former coach, Chuck Miller.
But she couldn’t keep the victory moment to herself as two Magic players charged her. Walden passed it to senior Maya Morahan under the net. A second later, she joined the group hug wrapped around the senior, whose buzzer-beater closed out the comeback victory. The Saints turned heel and mobbed Miller.
— Katherine Fominykh Sparrows Point 56, Perry Hall 31:
Sparrows Point got big nights from Nyah Hazelton and Vivian Windisch as the Pointers beat Perry Hall at home to improve to 7-1 this season.
Hazelton scored 30 points and Windisch backed her with 11. The two said the offense was clicking against a Gators team that entered the week undefeated before dropping its first game Wednesday to Pikesville.
Hazelton scored 22 of the team’s 30 firsthalf points alone as the Gators had no answers for her defensively.
— Anthony Maluso
Chesapeake-AA 69, Arundel 31
Glen Burnie 46, Southern 32
Indian Creek 95, Friends 33
Havre De Grace 49, Elkton 20
Park 56, Annapolis Area Christian 19 Gerstell 51, Mount de Sales 39 Pikesville 73, Western Tech 28 Hereford 61, Milford Mill 36
Howard 57, Wilde Lake 7
Mt. Hebron 43, Marriotts Ridge 33 Oakland Mills 57, Glenelg 53
River Hill 53, Centennial 31
Atholton 44, Long Reach 36