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Masco succumbs to Spellman in OT

Monday, December, 24 By Matt Jenkins
Staff writer

The score will be forgotten before the Masconomet girls basketball team plays another game. But Bob Romeo anticipates the lesson will stick around well into March.

Forced to play most of the second half and all of overtime without stars Caroline Stewart and Jamie White, the Chieftains gave Division 3 power Cardinal Spellman all it could handle in a 56-52 loss at home.

The Boston University-bound Stewart and White combined for 18 first half points, but each got into second-half foul trouble and fouled out in the last few minutes of regulation. Masco still led by two points after Annie Burns converted an old-fashioned three-point play with 7.7 seconds remaining, but an untimely foul allowed Spellman to tie it. The Chieftains simply couldn't match the talented Cardinals in overtime without Stewart and White.

"We matured today as a team. I really know that," Romeo said. "No one likes to lose, but there are such things as good losses."

Even Cardinal Spellman coach Pat Lamb chose to focus on the experience more than the result.

"We're not going undefeated, they're not going to go undefeated, so it was totally about the experience against a quality program with quality players," Lamb said. "It helps your kids mature. You can explain what to do at the end of a game, but unless they're out there in it sometimes they don't learn."

Lamb also conceded that the Cardinals would have faced a more difficult challenge had Stewart and White remained on the court.

Stewart, a 6-foot forward, scored 10 first-quarter points and finished with 13, while White, a junior guard, ended with a team-high 14 points and four blocks.

"It's a different game if those two are in there, absolutely," Lamb said. "We couldn't stop the White kid and early in the game we couldn't stop Stewart. That's not to say they're going to blow us out by any means because we made a run when they were in the game, and they made a run when they came out of the game."

The only real question mark facing the Chieftains this early in the season is the supporting cast, and Romeo got a pretty good indication that his team will be fine when he has to go to the bench.

Carly Kiernan and Julie Galvin gave Masco excellent minutes off the bench, while role player Merry DeAngelis showed she's quite capable of playing a starring role when needed.

Masco's most impressive stretch of the game came when White picked up her fourth foul in the third quarter and joined Stewart on the bench. White left the court with Masco leading 32-31, and all signs pointed to a Spellman run.

Instead, Kiernan put back a missed shot and DeAngelis knocked down back-to-back 3-pointers in one minute to boost Masco's lead to 40-31. DeAngelis finished with nine points and 10 boards.

Spellman's Alyssa Schlehuber caught fire in the second half, however, to help the Cardinals get back in the game. She scored 17 points after intermission, including the dagger | a corner three with 14 seconds left in overtime. Schlehuber pumped in 25 points for the game, joined by Reilly Poirier (10) in double figures.

Even though there was a positive vibe after the game, Romeo couldn't help but feel like the Chieftains let one get away. Burns' three-point play could have sealed the game, but the Chieftains bailed Spellman out with a foul.

"I thought we had them," Romeo said. "When Annie made the three-point play I thought that might be enough to get it. But, hey, they're a great team. Everybody knows they're going to be in the state championship mix come March (in Division 3). Pat does a great job coaching them. His teams don't panic."