WAKEFIELD– When your opponent struggles to make shots and put points on the board, it’s in your best interest to take advantage. When you let your opponent hang around, on the other hand, things tend to get interesting.
That was the theme of the Fenwick girls basketball team’s 42-34 win at Wakefield Sunday.
The Warriors whittled Fenwick’s 15-point halftime advantage down to four with 2:23 remaining in the game. Fenwick proceeded to put together a 7-0 run, effectively putting the game out of Wakefield’s reach.
“We haven’t had a full 32 minutes yet,” Crusaders coach Adam DeBaggis said. “That’s partially because we’re still a young team. Sometimes it’s tough to tell what really motivates people. We definitely need to play more consistently because if we do, we win by 30. Instead, what happened was we came out flat, they started crawling back in and it’s a nail-biter with two minutes left.”
Liz Gonzalez led Fenwick with 12 points, seven rebounds and two assists. Veronica Tache added 10 points, six steals, three rebounds and three assists. Annie Murphy, who played a key role in helping Fenwick weather the storm in the fourth quarter, scored nine points and hauled in five rebounds. Maria Orfanos contributed five points and two assists.
Bella Romero got Fenwick started with the game’s first basket but the next five minutes were scoreless on both sides. Romero added a layup to get Fenwick back on track and the Crusaders led 11-3 at the end of the first quarter.
Fenwick started the second quarter on an 8-0 run, stretching its lead to 19-3. Then the Crusaders lost their momentum. They went scoreless over the next several minutes before Orfanos made a swift move to the basket for a layup at the buzzer. Fenwick led 21-6 at halftime.
Wakefield’s Maeve Gaffney hit consecutive buckets to open the third quarter, cutting Fenwick’s edge to 21-10. Gonzalez fired back with a well-timed 3-pointer.
Emma Shinney drilled a 3-pointer and added a hoop for the final five points of the period and it was anybody’s game, 27-17, after three quarters.
Little by little, the Warriors worked their way into Fenwick’s lead in the fourth quarter. Shinney’s 3-pointer with a little over four minutes to go made it a 6-point game at 31-25. Her jumper off the glass with 2:23 to play brought Wakefield within four, 35-31.
Murphy bumped the lead to 38-31 with a layup. Tache’s free throws and Orfanos’ layup put the Warriors away for good.
“We’re closing out close games, regardless of why they’re close,” DeBaggis said. “They’re close by our own fault. But we’re still closing them out. Most of our wins have been close but we’ve won them all so that’s good. Liz is starting to heat up offensively, so that’s good. We have other players that are improving every day.”
Fenwick (8-3) hosts St. Mary’s Friday (6:30).
“We need more consistency,” DeBaggis said. “St. Mary’s is a much more veteran team than us. That’s when we’ll see what it takes against good teams. We need to play with more consistency to play good teams.”
The Crusaders need two wins to qualify for the Division 3 North state tournament.
“This is the most wins we’ve had this early in a long time,” DeBaggis said. “We play a tough schedule but it helps us once we get in the tournament. Once we get in, we can really work on what we need to work on. Then we don’t have to worry so much about winning games as we do about improving.”
