Revere pulls away late to put away Lawrence

REVERE ? A 14-0 run late in the third quarter turned a close game into a comfortable win for the Revere High girls’ basketball team, which defeated a pesky Lawrence squad, 72-53, in a Division 1 North first-round tournament game Tuesday night at Merullo Field House.
The fifth-seeded Patriots (17-4) take on fourth-seeded Billerica (18-3) at Billerica High on Saturday (7).
Tiphani Harris led all scorers with 21 points for Revere, while point guard Adanna Hector added 12, and freshman forward Valentina Pepic had 11. Kiandra Vasquez paced 12th-seeded Lawrence (12-9) with 15 points, while Aria Tate and Genesis Santana had 14 each.
A three-pointer by Santana from the right elbow with 5:32 left in the third quarter cut Revere’s lead to 34-32, but the Patriots ripped off the next 14 points, holding the Lancers scoreless for nearly five minutes. Harris and Pepic, who enjoyed height advantages over their Lawrence counterparts, combined for 10 points during the run.
?It wasn’t anything (strategic) that we did differently. We just played better defense,” Revere coach Diana DeCristoforo said.
The Lancers ended up scoring just nine points in the third quarter, which ended with Revere in command, 52-35.
?We just didn’t make shots,” Lawrence coach Dan Blouin said. “We were right there with them at halftime and at the start of the third quarter, but then we just didn’t get our shots to fall.”
Revere led the game from the midpoint of the first quarter, when a layup and a couple of free throws by Hector (a perfect 6-for-6 from the line for the game) put the Patriots on top, 8-5. The Patriots advanced the lead to seven twice in the second quarter, but the Lancers kept the game close with some good outside shooting by Vasquez and Tate. Pamela Gonzalez threw in a wild 10-footer from the seat of her pants just before the halftime buzzer to give Revere a 30-26 lead at the break.
Santana almost single-handedly kept Lawrence in the game in the third quarter before Revere’s decisive run.
Revere extended its lead to 19 (58-39) when Harris made a 5-footer off an inbounds pass with 6:25 left to play. But Lawrence made one last surge, going on an 8-1 run that forced DeCristoforo to call timeout and remind her team that the game was still in doubt. The Patriots responded with nine straight points to put the game away.?We’re still a young team that’s learning how to win,” DeCristoforo said. “Winning games in the tournament like this is important for our maturation process. We’ll be up for the challenge against a very good Billerica team on Saturday.”