Perkiomen Valley comes alive in 2nd half, advances past Owen J. Roberts, 51-42

ROYERSFORD >> After two lopsided contests in the two teams’ previous meetings in favor of the Vikings, the Perkiomen Valley girls basketball team found itself in unfamiliar territory Thursday against Owen J. Roberts.

Early into the third period, No. 3 seed Perkiomen Valley trailed No. 6 Owen J. Roberts by double digits.

Senior Jennifer Beattie, getting her first taste of PAC playoff experience, quickly turned the tide.

Beattie hit a trio of threes to close the gap to one at the end of the third and the Vikings distanced themselves in the fourth to pull off a 51-42 come-from-behind PAC Final Six win.

Beattie scored 23 points in the win as freshmen Quinn Boettinger and Bella Bacani chipped in nine and eight points, respectively, to set up a semifinal matchup with Pope John Paul II on Saturday.

“We’re so excited,” Beattie said. “Me and Emma (Miley), we’ve personally never made even a PAC game at all. Just reaching PAC semis is a huge accomplishment for us. We’re really excited to play PJP because we haven’t played them at all yet, and then we’re just excited to get that game and look for what’s next.”

Seeing Beattie and classmate Emma Miley have their time in the PAC playoffs was a rewarding experience for PV coach John Russo.

“From the beginning of the year, our goal, because they’ve never been here, was just to get here and let them enjoy the moments for all the hard work they put in. … I’m so happy for them. One of the goals to was to get them in here, get a couple games here, and see if they can go home with some memories.”

.@PVGBBALL senior Jennifer Beattie scored a game-high 23 points in the Vikings’ comeback when over OJR in Thursday’s PAC Final Six game. pic.twitter.com/OfIiebCZGh

— Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue) February 11, 2022

 

After falling 52-24 on Jan. 7 and 54-38 on Jan. 27 to the Vikings, Owen J. Roberts built a 23-15 halftime lead on Wednesday and scored on their first possession of the third to go ahead by 10.

Then came the Vikings’ run. Beattie hit a three at the 7:05 mark in the third to cut the deficit to five. Another three at the three-minute mark made it 29-27 OJR. Finally, a third triple of the quarter had PV within one, 31-30, heading to the fourth.

“Jen and the rest of the girls can all get hot at any moment, but she found her spots, and they found her in her spots and it was perfect basketball,” Russo said.

A bucket by Boettinger and three by Lena Stein gave PV a 36-31 lead with six minutes left and the Vikings never relented their advantage the rest of the way.

“We just knew we could do it,” Beattie said. “We played this team before. We knew Quinn was getting double, so we knew we had to hit some of the shooters outside. And we knew we could hit some of the shots when we needed to, and we just knew we could come back.”

With Bacani shadowing her throughout the game, OJR’s leading scorer Avery White was held to just three total points, well below her season average. Russo noted Emma Miley also place an important rule in positioning the Vikings’ defense.

The Wildcats used a well-balanced attack to keep things much tighter than the first two contests as Ashly White led the way with 12 points and Ava Clemson, Alexa Vogelman and Gabbi Koury all had nine.

They pulled within two, 44-42, on a three by Ashly White with 45 seconds left, but the Vikings made eight straight free throws and OJR’s offense ran out of steam, not scoring the rest of the game.

“Free throws are definitely a strength of ours,” Beattie said. “We practice them a lot in practice. We know at the end of the game, at the end of tight games, free throws are really important. It was important to hit those.”