Last-second shot sinks English girls

LYNN – English coach Fred Hogan couldn’t help but note the irony of how his team lost its first-round Division 1 North Sectional game to Masconomet at home Monday, 48-46.”They didn’t score a three-pointer the whole second half ? until she (Brooke Stewart) hits that one,” Hogan said. “We wanted to make them work, and we didn’t want to give up any layups, so we were playing a zone, and I thought we did a good job. She just hit a great shot.”Click here for a photo gallery.The fourth quarter of Monday’s game was going down as one of those “nobody wants to win” periods. Each team missed more shots than it made and balls were going out of bounds off people left and right. But English – which had led by as many as 10 in the third quarter – grabbed a one-point lead (achieved after Lashaunda Hogan hit a fade-away before being knocked on her backside by a Masco player trying to defend her) with 1:12 to go. Then the fun started.Each team had great chances to win ? but neither could hit the crucial shot. But with 06.5 to go, Masco got the ball after English knocked it out of bounds. Stewart set up from just beyond the arc, and sent one in that hit nothing but net.Bedlam ensued, but English still had a shot with 2.3 seconds to go. As soon as Jenicia Duggins picked up the rolling ball and crossed half-court, Hogan called a timeout, with 1.8 seconds left. The play called for Miranda Hogan to launch a three-pointer, and “I thought it was going in. I thought we had it. But it bounced off the rim.”Masco now awaits the winner of Wednesday’s Methuen-Andover game.”If it’s Andover,” Chieftains coach Bob Romeo said, “they’re one of the best teams in the state. But I’ll worry about that when the time comes. Right now, I’m going to enjoy this.”Romeo acknowledged that things didn’t look good for Masco (15-8) when Olivia Dupree (12 points) hit two consecutive hoops to give the Bulldogs (who finish at 17-6) a 40-30 lead. But Romeo figured the only way he had a shot after that was to go small and quick, so he inserted guards Taylor Evans and Sydney Godett into the lineup, and, said Hogan, “they matched our quickness after that.”Plus, said Hogan, “both defenses stepped it up, too.”Still, English had an eight-point lead going into the fourth quarter (40-32) but baskets by Carly Kiernan and Danielle Davis closed the gap quickly. Here, however, English caught a bad break. Miranda Hogan (nine points) spun around on the right side of the key and laid in a beautiful bank shot and – Fred Hogan thought – got fouled in the process. However, the referee had already called a foul on the floor, before the shot, and English came away with nothing.Incensed at the call after it happened, Hogan was still unhappy afterward.”That was crucial,” he said. “That would have been a nice one to have.”The sequence of events seemed to give Masco the impetus it needed to hang in, and methodically close the gap. The Chieftains and Bulldogs traded baskets, with Duggins (game-high 19 points) knocking one in with 4:07 to put English up by six (44-38). From then until Lashaunda Hogan’s basket, Masco reeled off seven straight points to take a 45-44 lead.Until English went up by 10 in the third quarter, neither team enjoyed much of an advantage from the start. It was tied at 16 after one and English was up by three – 28-25 at the break.”I’m sad for these kids,” Hogan said. “But it’s been an honor coaching them. Jenicia ended up with 526 points this season, which is pretty special. She’s the all-time leading girls scorer in school history. I’m pretty proud to have coached her.”This team showed a lot of heart,” he said. “We played undersized all year. We had no legitimate post game, and we still won our second league title in two years.”Stewart led Masco with 16 points, Kiernan had 11 and Emily Winskowicz 10.