Mars has nearly perfect second half
Planets make 14 of 16 field goals to secure victory in quarterfinals
That dang Andrew Recchia and Brandon Caruso missed one shot each in the second half. If it wasn’t for them, Mars would have been absolutely perfect.
Mars had a half for the ages Friday night in a PIAA Class 5A quarterfinal. These Planets were aligned right almost every time they shot the ball — 88 percent of the time, actually.
The near-perfect half broke open a close game and Mars rolled past Meadville, 73-57, in front of a near-packed house at Sharon High School.
Mars shot 16 times in the second half and made an incredible 14. The Planets had some driving layups, but also made a few mid-range shots and three 3-pointers, two of them from a ninth-grader.
Recchia, a senior guard who led Mars with 19 points, seemed mystified when told of the Planets’ marksmanship the second half.
“You mean if you combine our shots with our free throws?” he asked.
No, your team made almost 90 percent from the field in the second half.
“Huh,” Recchia said. “I don’t think we’ve had a half like that.”
Get out.
“Especially the fourth quarter,” Recchia said. “I think that was the best fourth quarter we’ve played this year. Being able to pull away at the end in a big game like that is huge. That’s a credit to our experience, our coaching, and everything.”
The win puts Mars (27-1) into the PIAA semifinals for the third time in the past four years. The Planets will play Moon in a rematch of a WPIAL championship game that was terrific.
But about Mars’ terrific second half . . . The Planets were ahead by only 44-41 when Meadville (20-7) scored with 31 seconds left in the third quarter. But Mars outscored Meadville, 15-5, over the next five minutes to take control.
“That’s really an unbelievable stat,” Mars coach Rob Carmody said of his team’s second-half shooting. “I knew we shot it well, but I didn’t know we shot it that well.”
Really, the shooting statistic was a symbol of how efficient Mars played. The Planets had only four turnovers the entire game and made 19 of 22 free throws.
“Was it a perfect half? I don’t want to say it was a perfect half, because we fouled a jump shooter on a 3-pointer and made a couple lazy passes against their press,” Carmody said. “But other than that …”
Mars had five players in double figures. Besides Recchia’s 19, senior guard Khori Fusco scored 14, junior forward Michael Carmody 13, senior guard Brandon Caruso 12 and freshman guard Zach Schlegel came off the bench to score 10, all in the second half. Carmody (6-7, 290 pounds) also had 13 rebounds. Mars’ guards controlled the second half. Fusco was 4 of 4 and capped the game with a dunk just before the final buzzer. Recchia was 2 for 3 in the final two quarters, Caruso 3 of 4 and Schlegel 4 of 4.
“We have three senior guards, and they’re really good,” Carmody said. “They really can handle the ball, and what I loved is they didn’t over-dribble tonight. They dribbled to go somewhere and create an angle.”
On top of that, Mars played pretty good man-to-man defense, especially on Meadville’s 6-foot-8 Lashon Lindsey, who had averaged 23 points a game and is the school’s all-time leading scorer. The 6-2 Fusco defended Lindsey the entire game. and Lindsey finished with 22 points, but nine came in the final three minutes after the outcome was decided. Meadville was hurt by the absence of 6-3 junior guard Davyon Butler, who only played briefly at the start of the contest because of an injured ankle.
“With a kid like [Lindsey], our who goal was to make him work,” Carmody said. “We wanted him to make tough shots.”
There were no tough shots for Mars in the second half.