Sweeney’s big 2nd quarter helps Archbishop Carroll top North Penn

TOWAMENCIN >> Each shot Erin Sweeney made from beyond the 3-point line brought a bit more certainty the next one was going in as well.

“I guess after I made a couple my confidence started going up,” the Archbishop Carroll senior said. “Cause I missed my first few shots of the game so after I made a couple my confidence started going up.”

Sweeney scorched the nets from long range in the second quarter Monday night against host North Penn, the Drexel commit connecting on five 3-pointers in scoring 17 points in the period, helping the Patriots build an 11-point halftime lead.

“Because she practices all the time we’re not shocked cause we see it all the time,” Patriots coach Renie Shields said. “She puts the extra in every day and just happy for her that she’s seeing some results.”

Sweeney went on to post a game-high 23 points while the defending Philadelphia Catholic League champs held off the Knights in the second half, improving to 2-0 on the season with a 69-57 nonleague victory.

“I think when a good shooter knows that they’re on, they find ways to get shots up and I think she did that,” said North Penn coach Jen Carangi of Sweeney. “I also think there were lapses, I think we could have done a much better job in terms of defense. And we were guarding her and we actually we kind of face-guarding her and she would ways to get through and instead of helping, our girls would kind of just like, ‘We’ll that’s someone else’s responsibility.’

“I said to them at halftime that if you’re on the playground and a girl’s making that many shots, at some point don’t you say I’m going to step up and guard her cause she’s not going to do that anymore.”

Sweeney scored just two points after halftime, sitting the final 7:44 after tweaking an ankle on a drive to the basket. Grace O’Neill finished with 16 points as the Patriots responded to North Penn (1-1) cutting the margin to four in the third with a 12-3 run to go up 52-39. From there Carroll’s lead never slipped into single digits.

“I thought we stayed engaged throughout the game,” Shields said. “They’re a very good team and you see they’re very well coached and they made a lot of good adjustments, took Erin out in the second half. And I like the way Grace O’Neill stepped up and played really well and then Karli Dougherty and then the other kids are coming along as we move into the season, but I was really proud of how they just hung in there.”

Valerie McGriff paced the Knights with 16 points while Alli Lindsay hit a trio of 3-pointers in adding 14 points. North Penn stayed close for most of the first half until Carroll went into the break on a 13-5 run — 11 points provided by Sweeney.

“You just know when you play against Carroll, I mean Renie is such a great coach, that you know they’re going to be well coached and it’s going to be a challenge no matter what,” Carangi said. “Particularly on a night like tonight when they’re making shots like they were, it’s just an uphill battle the whole way.”

McGriff began the third quarter with a three-point play inside at 7:44 while a Lindsay 3-pointer capped a 9-2 run that pulled the Knights within 40-36. But Carroll got a lift from Maggie Grant in scoring 12 of the next 15 — Grant collected seven points during that span, draining a 3-pointer to make it 50-39 then adding two more to extend the lead to 52-39.

“A few times to the girls’ credit we did make runs, little mini-runs but then we had mental lapses,” Carangi said. “And that quick, we cut it four and then next thing you know we’re down eight because they are going to capitalize on every mistake that we make.”

The Patriots led 54-44 at the end of the third and then pushed the advantage to as much as 15 — 62-49 after O’Neill made both ends of a 1-and-1 with 4:32 left — in a free-throw heavy fourth, the two sides combining for 28 foul shots in the last eight minutes.

North Penn has two more challenging contest this week, visiting Neshaminy 7 p.m. Tuesday then begins SOL Continental Conference play at home against Souderton 6:30 p.m. Thursday.

“Our first week is going to tell us a lot,” Carangi said. “Even just from a perspective of resilience, like how mentality tough are we, how physically tough are we? Being able to endure this cause we’re playing a lot of games in a short period of time. Good news is it’s early in the season, they’re not to the point yet where there’s many injuries or not really tired, season’s really just started.”

Archbishop Carroll starts its PCL Blue Division schedule Friday hosting Bonner & Prendergast at 7 p.m. The Patriots then face Maret School out of Washington, D.C. in the She Got Game Classic in Springdale, Virginia 11:10 a.m. Saturday.

Carroll took the lead for good Monday with a nine straight points in the first quarter — Nikki Mostardi corner 3-pointer putting the Patriots up 11-6. Rachel Dunn’s buzzer-beat had North Penn down just 13-12 at the end of the quarter.

The Knights were again within one when Lindsay’s basket made it at 17-16 but an 8-2 burst gave Carroll a 25-18 lead after a Sweeney triple. After NP cut the margin to 25-22 on a Kate Early free throw at 3:52, Sweeney answered with another three.

“My teammates would get in the middle and then the skip pass would be open so that was really good on their part,” Sweeney said.

A McGriff jumper got the Knights’ deficit down to four however the Patriots scored the next eight — two Sweeney threes sandwiching a Dougherty jumper — for a 36-24 advantage. A Carley Adams three made it 36-27 but Sweeney collected the last two of her 17 points in the quarter, giving Carroll the 11-point lead at the half.

Archbishop Carroll 69, North Penn 57
Archbishop Carroll           13 25 16 15 — 69
North Penn        12 15 17 13 — 57
Archbishop Carroll: Erin Sweeney 9 0-0 23; Grace O’Neill 5 5-6 16; Karli Dougherty 3 2-4 8; Maggie Grant 3 1-4 8; Nikki Mostardi 2-36 8; Taylor Wilson 2 2-2 6; Totals 24 13-22 69.
North Penn: Valerie McGriff 5 6-8 16; Alli Lindsay 4 3-4 14; Carley Adams 3 0-4 7; Kate Early 2 2-3 6; Rachel Dunn 2 1-3 5; Rachel Strobel 1 2-2 4; Abby Plaugher 1 0-0 3; Laynie Doran 1 0-0 2; Totals 19 14-24 57.
Three-pointers: AC-Sweeney 5, Grant, Mostardi, O’Neill; NP-Lindsay 3, Adams, Plaugher.