RallyNorth.net

Gloucester girls starting to click

Friday, January, 25 By Matt Langone
Staff writer

When you ask Jon Flanagan if he believes his Gloucester girls basketball team is playing their best ball of the season, the Fishermen head coach channels his inner Bill Belichick.

"I think we're improving, but there's a long way to go," said Flanagan, answering the aforementioned question in true Belichickian form, which always looks ahead and never behind.

With eight regular-season games still to be played, Flanagan's point is certainly accurate. However, the three-game winning streak that Gloucester is riding also seems to validate the point that the Fishermen are indeed playing at their highest level of the winter thus far.

The reason for the success is easy to pinpoint for Flanagan. "Well, certainly being healthy is one aspect and the other is how we've been playing defensively," said Flanagan, whose team is 7-4 overall and 5-3 in the Northeastern Conference South. "It begins with the energy and enthusiasm of the team."

During this winning streak, the Fishermen have played suffocating defense and haven't allowed more than 43 points in victories over Lynn Classical, Salem and Beverly. Gloucester has used its 10-deep roster to hound opponents, while keeping all of its players fresh to run around the court and trap the ball.

It's also been beneficial to have senior guard Jill Lukegord back in the lineup for the last three contests after she missed five games with a sprained ankle. Lukegord is an athletic do-everything type of player, who is averaging 8.5 points per game. She also uses last year's 4-14 campaign as added motivation this winter.

"Having Jill's experience back in the lineup has helped a great deal," said Flanagan. "She is one of the people who experienced the poor season last year, and she doesn't want to go through that again."

While the Fishermen have been stingy defensively, they have also had a difficult time producing points. Gloucester has only scored 50 or more points four times. It has been the team's inability to score on a consistent basis that prevented the Fishermen from knocking off NEC powers Peabody and Danvers. In both games, Gloucester was still competitive, falling by 12 points in each.

"The idea is that we need to get more points in transition," Flanagan said.

Freshman point guard Hannah Cain leads the team in scoring at 12.5 points per game. Lindsey Rogers (9.5 ppg), Lukegord, Olivia Lufkin (7.7 ppg) and Alicia Unis (6 ppg) have also proved to be capable scorers at times this year.

The Fishermen may not possess that one end-of-the-game, go-to player, but Flanagan likes the fact that several players on his team are capable of scorching an opponent. "It's a great luxury because other teams can't key on one player," he said.

Gloucester needs just three more wins to qualify for the state tournament, an accomplishment that has happened in eight of Flanagan's previous 10 seasons at Gloucester. The schedule will be tough down the stretch, beginning at home with 10-3 Lynn English tonight (7 p.m.). Two meetings with mighty Winthrop and rematches with Swampscott and Danvers are also on the February landscape.

"(Tonight) will be a good test against Lynn English," Flanagan said. "It should be a tournament atmosphere."