Gwynedd Mercy shakes off slow start, pulls away to beat Freire Charter in PIAA-5A 1st round

WARMINSTER >> As the Gwynedd Mercy girls basketball team pushed its lead over Freire Charter into double digits in the third quarter, Hannah Griffin knew it was the right moment to put her stamp on the PIAA-5A first round contest.

“I just have the mentality that I just needed to take over the game,” Griffin said. “I know it’s obviously win and go home and it’s just that situation where ‘Oh my gosh, I need to pick it up.”

With the Monarchs already up 35-22, the senior guard collected back-to-back baskets while a Emilia Coleman two off a Bailey Balkir assist sent GMA to the fourth up 19 on the Dragons.

Griffin opened the final quarter with consecutive pull-up jumpers, extending the advantage to 45-22 and the Monarchs cruised from there, shaking off their offensive struggles in the first half and rolling to a 59-34 victory at Archbishop Wood.

“Obviously in the beginning I think I was worried about the team more as a whole, which I still worried about in the third and fourth quarter,” Griffin said. “But I also started worrying more about my game and how I can be very effective within our offense.”

Griffin scored 10 of her team-high 17 points after halftime as Gwynedd Mercy (21-7) earned a state tournament win for an eighth straight season. The Monarchs look to reach the PIAA quarterfinals for a third year in a row – the previous two in Class 4A – Wednesday against District 11 champ Bethlehem Catholic at a site and time to be announced.

The Golden Hawks, who topped Upper Moreland 46-36 in the first round, knocked GMA from states in the 2017 4A semifinals and the 4A second round in both 2019 and 2020.

“We know we have to continue to keep working hard Monday and Tuesday and we know we have to play better,” Gwynedd Mercy coach Tom Lonergan said. “We know we have to play for 32 minutes against Beca.”

Freire Charter, the second-place side from District 12, had just two players score but both ended up in double figures. Kylah Hargrove had a game-high 18 points – including all of the Dragon’s 12 second-quarter points – while Destiny Davis posted 16 points.

Balkir scored six points in both the first and third quarter in finishing with 15 points. Emilia Coleman recorded eight of her 10 points in the third as the Monarchs eclipsed 50 points for the first time in six postseason games.

“What I kind of reminded ‘em is relax, get some easy stuff and then the points will start falling,” Lonergan said. “But it’s the defensive end of the floor we had to really do something about. And I thought we were able to hold them to 22 for a long, long stretch and that allowed us to really open up the game, get some transition going and start to feel more comfortable out in the floor.”

Adding to the scoring struggles has been injuries and ailments taking its toll on GMA. Junior center Dylan Burke was lost to a knee injury suffered in practice during the District 1 playoffs. Lauren Drakeley, who returned in February from injury playing soccer, was unavailable Saturday due to strep throat.

The Monarchs, however, did get back sophomores Cara Lapp – out since a concussion in the Catholic Academies final – and Carsy Kelly, who had an Achilles injury. Lapp provided five points while Kelly chipped in three points.

“It’s been one thing after another,” Lonergan said. “But we know we don’t have Dylan, but I feel good that we have Carsy who’s back and she’s got some minutes underneath her. Lauren, now Lauren had some minutes against Bishop Shanahan (in the district third place game), so she played in Dylan’s spot against Bishop Shanahan, she played pretty well and then she got the strep throat and has been out since.”

Gwynedd Mercy got out to a solid start Saturday, a Griffin 3-pointer getting the Monarchs out to an 8-2 lead. A Balkir basket off a steal made it 12-5 with GMA ending the first quarter up 14-7 after a Kelly jumper.

Two Griffin free throws at 5:49 in the second quarter had the Monarchs up 16-7 but District 1’s fourth-place side registered just six more points in the half.

A Coleman three made it 19-12 but three straight points from Hargrove had Freire within 19-14. Lapp drained a trey, putting GMA up seven but a Hargrove basket cut the margin to 22-17 at intermission.

Coleman began scoring in the third with a putback before a Davis triple pulled the Dragons to within 24-20.

Balkir, however, connected on two free throws at 6:48 then hit a jumper while Coleman’s 3-point play in transition put the Monarchs up 31-20 at 4:48. A Balkir basket capped a 9-0 run, extending the margin to 13.

“Definitely our composure and definitely our way of just passing the ball was, I think, a lot better,” Griffin said. “We kind of started looking for each other more instead of just looking for ourselves and then we just kind of feed off of our defense as well. Our defense picked up in the third quarter and good defense creates good offense.

Davis scored off a drive to make it 33-22 but GMA collected the final eight points of the quarter – four of those from Griffin – to go up 41-22.

Griffin’s consecutive jumper had the Monarchs’ lead at 21 before Davis drained back-to-back 3-pointers to make it 45-28. Balkir answered with a three while a basket from Mary Kate Donahue pushed GMA’s advantage to 22 at 50-28. Gwynedd Mercy’s lead got as large as 26 at 59-33 in the final minute.

Gwynedd Mercy 59, Freire Charter 34
Freire Charter 7 10 5 12 – 34
Gwynedd Mercy 14 8 19 18 – 59
Freire Charter: Kylah Hargrove 7 2- 9 18; Destiny Davis 6 1-2 16; Totals 13 3-11 34.
Gwynedd Mercy: Hannah Griffin 7 2-2 17; Bailey Balkir 5 4-4 15; Emilia Coleman 4 1-3 10; Cara Lapp 2 0-0 5; Carsy Kely 1 1-2 3; Carli Amos 0 2-2 2; Mary Kate Donahue 1 0-0 2; Kirsten Hassan 1 0-0 2; Megan McDonnell 1 0-0 2; Elisabeth Grabish 0 1-2 1; Totals 22 11-15 59.
3-pointers: FC-Davis 3, Hargrove 2; GMA-Balkir, Coleman, Griffin, Lapp.