Boverini girls hoop final to feature Classical vs. English

LYNN – Like their boys counterparts, the Classical and English girls basketball teams will get an extra game together this year, thanks to the Walter J. Boverini Holiday Tournament.The Bulldogs sprinted out to a big lead in the first of the four-game, inter-city tournament – which is now in its fourth year – before Tech staged a furious second-half comeback. Alas, for the Tigers, it fell short and English prevailed, 44-37.In the other game, it took Classical almost the entire game to shake St. Mary’s, but the Rams finally pulled away late in the fourth quarter to defeat the Spartans, 55-47.The girls championship game will be tonight (5) at the St. Mary’s gym.It appeared as if English would run Tech back to Neptune Boulevard in the first game. English had a first-quarter lead of 16-4, and upped it to 25-7 at the break.”I don’t know whether it was lack of playing, lack of practicing, or what it was,” said Tech coach John Crowley. “Their press certainly bothered us. We’ll have to work on that.”That was as bad as it would get for Tech.”While we played a lot better in the second half, and that’s a positive,” Crowley said, “the first half is a negative.”Each team scored 14 points in the third quarter as Tech’s shots started finding the basket while English was as cold in the final 16 minutes as Tech was in the first half.”We played their style of ball,” said English coach Fred Hogan, “which is helter-skelter. We didn’t set anything up. We couldn’t get anything going.”Tech staged a fourth-quarter rally, as both Jessica Underwood (16 points) and Zulieka Lopez (12) got hot. The Tigers also received some valuable offense from Katrina Freeman (six points, all of them in the final eight minutes).English managed only five points in the fourth quarter, but it had built enough of a lead after the first half that whatever Tech did, it was too little, too late.”We let them go on that run,” Hogan said. “We didn’t play any defense.”This is not how we play,” he said.Crowley said his team didn’t do anything different than it did in the first half.”We just played hard,” he said. “If we don’t play hard, we don’t win.”Both Jeanette Anderson and Jenicia Duggins played well for English. Anderson had 19 points and 25 rebounds, “and she clearly controlled the boards,” Hogan said. Duggins finished with a very efficient 13.Classical 55, St. Mary’s 47This was the Christina McKenzie show, as the Rams guard poured in a game-high 22 points, including four three-pointers.”She’s a real force on offense,” said Classical coach Tom Sawyer. “And she’s starting to show a little more on defense, too. She had a great game.”This one was back-and-forth, even though Classical led most of the way.St. Mary’s got good games from Tori Faieta, who finished with 14 points despite hitting a cold stretch early in the game; and Jenna Blydell, who finished with 12 and propelled the Rams back into the game with five straight points early in the third quarter.An Amy Bozarjian three-pointer pulled St. Mary’s – which trailed by six at the half – to within a point early in the fourth quarter. But from there, it was all Classical.”I thought we played better than we have been playing,” St. Mary’s coach Jeff Newhall said. “We had our opportunities.”Give them credit. They earned the win. This was definitely a game we could have won.”