Mount Saint Joseph hangs on against Gwynedd Mercy rally to reach AACA final

SPRINGFIELD >> With a little more than a minute left and her team out of sorts, Lauren Vesey drove into the lane.

The Mount Saint Joseph Academy senior converted the layup for her team’s first and only basket of the fourth quarter, giving the Magic a five-point lead in front of a furious Gwynedd Mercy Academy rally. Playing for the third time this season, the rivals had some new tricks for each other in another game that came down to the final few possessions.

A big game from Grace Niekelski and enough poise plays late helped No. 2 seed Mount Saint Joseph hold off No. 3 Gwynedd Mercy Academy 40-34 in the AACA semifinals at La Salle College High School.

“We didn’t adjust as well as we should have and got away from what got us that lead and we lost a little bit of our composure at that time,” Mount coach Matt Feeney said. “The good news was the kids came back and regained their composure at a time they needed to.”

Mount was determined to use its height advantage as its edge and to that end, its first basket was off a Niekelski post-up on the low block. Niekelski and Kelly Rothenberg, the two tallest players in the Magic’s starting five, had all 10 of the team’s points for a 10-8 lead after a quarter.

The most significant development of the opening quarter however, had to do with fouls. Gwynedd Mercy senior Sarah White was tagged with her second personal on a touch foul in the opening quarter, forcing Monarchs coach Tom Lonergan to sit White next to him on the bench until the second half.

White was the offensive catalyst behind the Monarchs getting back in the game, but their offense struggled without her in the second quarter.

“She usually does a good job avoiding that, but this is a tough, emotional game and sometimes that feeds into it and causes you to do things you wouldn’t normally do, but that was a killer for us,” Lonergan said. “They know my rule, they get two, they sit next to me. Maybe I could have done a little offense-defense like we did in the fourth quarter, but that’s the only thing I would have done differently.”

Niekelski, who led all scorers with 20, did not slow down either, as the junior had a hand in every scoring play of the second quarter for her team. She had eight points, including two 3-pointers and dished an assist to the Magic’s third interior presence in Audrey Bryce as the Mount climbed to a 22-12 halftime edge.

The Mount offense, mixing transition play with its halfcourt inside game, continued to hum through the third quarter but its defense had also been a factor in the first half. As it did in the previous two meetings, the Mount threw different defenders at Gwynedd’s guards in man-to-man and mixed in some zone including a new wrinkle.

“We tried a triangle-and-two to try and shut Kaylie (Griffin) and Sarah down which I think threw them off a little bit,” Niekelski said. “Taylor (Sistrunk) and Lauren played really well and really hard the whole time.”

Just like the first half, the Magic went to a seal on the low block for a basket to start the third quarter. Mount had a solid offensive quarter, again paced by Niekelski who had six in the frame on a three and an and-one play.

White, freed from her seat on the bench, came back with a vengeance. The sharpshooter erupted, scoring the Monarchs’ first 11 points of the quarter but the team’s defense wasn’t able to get enough stops for her scoring to make much headway into the Mount lead.

“This game today really helped us prepared,” Niekelski said. “Playing these teams makes us better each time. We’ve been trying to work on our poise, it was the word on our board again today and I think we showed it in the second half.”

That all changed in the fourth quarter. Gwynedd went to a press defense using a lineup of Hannah Griffin, Mollie Hanson, Bianca Coleman, Sofia Coleman and Maddie Newell with White subbing in for Newell on offensive possessions and got Mount off its game.

A 37-26 Mount lead at the end of the third slowly whittled down, with Sofia Coleman converting an and-one, White splitting two trips to the line around a Newell steal and finally a three from White cutting the lead to 37-34 with 2:46 to go.

“You’re down 11, you don’t have much choice and we can press, we have pressed teams,” Lonergan said. “That was one of our better pressing lineups and that’s what they did. It wasn’t a concern for me in the fourth quarter because I felt I had the right players I wanted to in our pressure.”

“I definitely frazzled us, they don’t usually do that and we hadn’t worked on it a lot,” Niekelski, who added 11 rebounds said. “I think we were able to handle it by the end.  We just had to trust each other, we knew we had to have a second pass, we couldn’t leave one girl alone with the ball to get doubled.”

Vesey drew a foul but missed both free throws, giving the Monarchs a window as the clock ticked below two minutes. Rothenberg was able to alter two shots at the rim on the ensuing possession, with Niekelski securing the board before Vesey made amends with her driving score that made it 39-34 with 1:17 to play.

“We’ve been talking about poise all season and the message is really resonating with them,” Feeney said. “When you go from up 11 to six to three, it’s easy to crumble and they really didn’t.

“We hadn’t scored in about a month, at least that’s what it felt like, so it was a big hoop for us and I told her that right after. That’s a senior making a good basketball play.”

Mount wasn’t in the clear yet but the Magic’s defense got a couple more stops, with Bryce contributing a key block and rebound in there and Niekelski grabbing a defensive board with 3.5 left up six to help put the result away.

The Magic will face No. 1 seed St. Basil Academy in the final, set for a 7 p.m. start Wednesday night back at La Salle. Mount’s last appearance in the final came in 2016, it’s last title in 2015, but Feeney joked his players looked the same as they had after any other win this season.

“We’re going to look at it as a chance to do something special,” Feeney said. “It’s why you want to play in this league and coach in this league, it’s a competitive, competitive league.”

After playing five games in seven days to end the regular season, the Monarchs now have a long wait before they get on the court again. Gwynedd Mercy, in line to be the top seed in the District 1-4A tournament, must now rebound and find a way to stay sharp with a week-and-a-half wait for their first district game.

“We have a long wait, so we have a couple days to regroup and think about what they need to do,” Lonergan said. “We talked about we’re at the point now where it’s one-and-done and it’s your second chance. The Academy playoffs, it usually doesn’t finish your season and we have the opportunity to accomplish a few of the things we’d like to accomplish.”

MOUNT ST. JOSEPH 40, GWYNEDD MERCY 34
MOUNT SAINT JOSEPH 10 10 17 3 – 40
GWYNEDD MERCY 8 4 14 8 – 34
Mount St. Joseph: Lauren Vesey 2 1-4 5, Kelly Rothenberg 5 0-2 11, Taylor Sistrunk 1 0-2 2, Audrey Bryce 1 0-0 2, Grace Niekelski 8 1-2 20. Totals: 17 2-10 40.
Gwynedd Mercy: Kaylie Griffin 2 1-2 6, Sarah White 5 4-6 19, Sofia Coleman 2 1-2 5, Bianca Coleman 2 0-0 4. Totals: 11 6-10 34.
3-pointers: MSJA – Niekelski 3, Rothenberg; GMA – White 5, Griffin.