Archbishop Wood survives early foul trouble, beats Bishop McDevitt in PIAA AAA 1st round
PHILADELPHIA >> Early foul trouble can affect teams in one of two ways. Teams that lack depth can find it crippling, while teams with a deeper bench can fight through it and prevail.
Saturday, Archbishop Wood was tested by that exact scenario, as the Vikings found themselves with six quick team fouls and having to bench a couple of their starters. Luckily for the Vikings, their bench didn’t skip a beat, as they bolted out to a 17-9 first quarter lead on their way to a 62-38 victory over Bishop McDevitt in the first round of the PIAA Class AAA state tournament.
The win means Wood will advance in the PIAA tournament, as the Vikings have really stepped up their play in the second half of the season. They’ll have their work cut out for them too, as they matchup against District 4 champion Danville (26-1) on Wednesday.
“We always tell our bench to be ready,” Wood head coach Mike McDonald said. “Those kids are in the rotation, today it looked like we might be going deeper in our bench so those kids need to be ready and they usually are. I’m fortunate that I have a lot of kids on this team that can play and be ready to play when their number is called.”
Karly Brown and Shannon May were certainly ready when their numbers were called. May netted five first quarter points as the starters sat out, while Brown added six of her own, allowing the Vikings to relieve some of the early pressure and maintain the early lead.
From there it was business as usual for Wood, as some of the familiar names were able to get going and keep their foot on the gas on their way to a convincing win.
Leading scorer Bailey Greenberg had a night to remember on the stat sheet, as she finished with 19 points and 14 rebounds, dominating the smaller McDevitt lineup and having her way on the low block.
“I think we were just a little shaken up by the fouls at first,” Greenberg said. “We had so many fouls early and had to take a step back, but then once we got through that we just wanted to come out full force and stay focused. We really want to get back to Hershey, we really want a state title, we’re tired of coming in second.”
That determination showed not only for Greenberg, but for fellow starter Kate Connolly as well.
Connolly, who is just a sophomore, dictated much of the game from not only an offensive prospective, where she finished with 14 points, but from the defensive end as well.
“Kate Connolly was gigantic, she was huge,” McDonald said. “I think she scored the first basket of the game and then got the two fouls and came out and then when we put her in to start the second quarter she picked right up where she left off with a couple layups. I thought in the second half she was a big boost for us as far as getting that bigger lead. I thought she made some nice steals defensively and just made a lot of nice plays, I was real happy with Kate (Connolly) today.”
McDevitt battled early on and even as Wood opened up a bigger lead in the second quarter, it fought back to get the deficit to nine, but the Vikings were just too big on the glass.
Greenberg and Connolly alone outrebounded them 21-17, so even when they were getting stops, Wood was able to bury them with second chance points.
“I thought when we brought it down to 9 we were going to have a chance to get back in it,” McDevitt head coach Joe Bressi said. “We had them take a lot of the shots we wanted but we gave them second and third shots and that’s where they hurt us. We’re not big inside and they just got too many second shots for us to stay in it.”
