New Hope-Solebury upsets St. Basil in District 1-AA final

NORTHAMPTON >> For a hopeful second, while the ball hung in the air, it looked like St. Basil’s District 1 Class AA title streak was going to extend another year.

But as the ball’s flight waned, it made contact with the front of the rim, caromed off the backboard and fell to an elated New Hope-Solebury player. Slowly and dejectedly, the Panthers made their way off the floor as New Hope’s bench emptied into a celebration at midcourt.

St. Basil couldn’t survive an uncharacteristically off day as it fell 32-31 to New Hope in the District I AA title game at Council Rock South. It was the first District title for New Hope since 1979 while St. Basil’s senior class was denied its fourth consecutive title.

“We have a good group of seniors so you feel bad for them,” St. Basil coach Terry Mancini said. “It’s never easy to into a locker room after a loss like that. It wasn’t our best game, but that’s not taking anything away from New Hope-Solebury, they played with a lot of intensity which I felt we lacked. Turnovers killed us.”

St. Basil (20-5) committed 22 turnovers, a high number for the team. But the Panthers were also without point guard Lindsay Joyce, who went down with an injury against Mount St. Joseph in the AACA tournament and missed the district semifinals. Without their leader, the Panthers asked other players to step out of their comfort zone and do a little more than they had been all season.

Neither team was particularly sharp in the first half, with the game having no real flow save for a 7-0 run midway through the second quarter. Basil started 1-of-7 from the floor, with junior center Natalie Kucowski opening 1-of-5. New Hope (25-2) took a 6-2 lead with 4:00 left in the first frame, taking advantage of Basil’s poor passing and slow start offensively.

Much of replacing Joyce’s impact fell to senior Karen Lapkiewicz, who poured everything she had into her last game. But replacing a heady point guard like Joyce in two games was a big ask.

“It hurts us a lot because it puts a lot of onus on Karen,” Mancini said. “She’s doing a lot more than she has to and we couldn’t take her off the floor. She played her heart out.”

The Lions led 11-7 after one, but the second quarter started at an absolute crawl, with neither team scoring for the first three minutes. Kucowski finally broke the levee with two free throws, kicking off a 7-0 run that put the Panthers up 14-11 with 4:15 left in the first half. After that 40-second blur, the game again slowed and the teams traded hoops down the stretch.

Basil couldn’t shake its turnover issues and a long outlet off an inbound led to a layup by Sarah Wilson with 13 seconds left. New Hope held that one point lead, 20-19, at the break.

Wilson would impact the game quite a bit in the second half. The guard, who her coach loves to compare to Steph Curry, scored five of her seven points after the half, including the last five New Hope points.

St. Basil came out of the break much more energized with Lapkiewicz and Jules Gura setting a tone defensively, both guards flying across the floor and deflecting plenty of passes. That effort was needed after Kucowski picked up her fourth foul with 2:38 left in the third quarter.

Gura scored five straight to end the third with Basil up 28-24, but after Maggie Dougherty hit a trey to cut the lead to one, Kucowski returned with 4:37 left in the game. The junior center then caught the Lions napping on a backdoor cut for a layup with 3:46 left. It would be the last points of the game for Basil.

With 1:37 left, Wilson hit a pull-up 3 to cut the lead to 31-30, a move that came as a byproduct of countless hour of watching her favorite player.

“I was trying to be like Steph Curry,” Wilson said. “I’ve been practicing it and it paid off.”

The sophomore piled on her impact plays 35 seconds later when she flew into a passing lane, picked off the ball and drove the full length of the floor. She got fouled going for a layup, the fifth and final on Kucowski, then calmly stepped up and sank the first.

“Everyone was saying it’s just like practice,” Wilson said. “I was just thinking, I’ll just take my time.”

Basil called a timeout after the first freebie, but Wilson wasn’t shaken, instead saying her teammates kept her calm. She then drilled the second for the 32-31 lead. Basil turned the ball over on the following possession, but after fouling and getting a miss, Lapkiewicz grabbed the rebound.

The guard dribbled the floor, drove in and went up for a shot, but couldn’t get it to go. Mancini said he felt there should have been a foul called, but either way, the ball still ended up with Basil with 1.5 seconds left.

The ball went out to the arc and the 3 looked good from release, but it wasn’t meant to be.

“We were looking for an inside play and they took it away,” Mancini said. “Lindsay Joyce is usually our inbounder so we had a different player throwing it in. It looked good coming out of her hand.”

After exiting the locker room but before leaving the gym one last time, Mancini and Lapkiewicz shared a long embrace, with coach and guard thanking each other for the last four years.

“I’m going to miss Karen, she’s one of the best players I’ve ever coached with her attitude, her performance in school, she’s just a great all around kid, and I feel really bad for her,” Mancini said. “It’s the same for the other kids.”