Girls Hoops: Lady Cards Use Hot Shooting to Down Norristown, 62-43

When a single loss can mean the difference between holding home court advantage in the playoffs, or traveling to face some of the district's best in their gym, every game becomes important in girls basketball. Luckily for the Lady Cardinals of Upper Dublin, they can cross one more game off the home stretch portion of their schedule after defeating Norristown 62-43 at home Tuesday night.

"It was a very big game for our team because we really needed to get some points on the power system," said head coach Vincent Catanzaro. "We needed this game really bad, and we shot the ball really well."

The Lady Cardinals (15-4, 8-2) were led by guard Taylor Bryant's 26 points and complimented by hot-shooting from forwards Jen Myers (10) Lauren Rothfeld (9) and Brianna Spector (8). Guard Nicole Graham led Norristown (8-10, 5-5) with 15 points.

As usual, the Lady Cardinals hung their hat on the defensive end, limiting Norristown's standout center Tyshay Britten to 7 points with constant double teams.

"We did a real good job taking care of [Britten]. We just crowded her to the point where she couldn't even move sometimes," said Catanzaro. "That forces other kids to shoot the ball."

After allowing the first basket of the game, the Lady Cards' defense clamped down to open up an 11-2 lead. Rothfeld, typically a post player who is now finding herself in the swing position, hit two threes sandwiched around a block to help spark the run. The Lady Eagles would only score one more basket in the frame as Upper Dublin took a 15-4 lead into the second quarter.

The second quarter belonged to Bryant, as the senior guard found her rhythm to score 11 in the frame. With point guard Cutrena Goff having difficulty finding the basket, Bryant drove the lanes and collected a number of offensive rebounds for putbacks. Bryant would score a quick basket at the buzzer to push the lead to 35-18 at the half.

"The last few days we practiced vey hard on talking," said Catanzaro. "Who's coming around, who's covering who, what do we gotta do, who's stepping up, who's coming down, and we did a much better job today [than the previous game]."

Upper Dublin would continue to pull away to start the third, opening up their largest lead of the night at 55-29 on a put back by Jen Myers at the 1:18 mark. The Lady Eagles would get no closer than 18 the rest of the way. Each time it looked like the visitors might get a run started, they would turn the ball over or have it stolen, leading to easy points at the other end.

"We knew they would be aggressive, and it was a big key for us," said Catanzaro. "We had a couple of set plays… had a girl double back and steal the ball [on the inbounds pass] a couple times after we scored."

By the time the final buzzer sounded following a lay-in by Larissa Leyes, Upper Dublin had built itself a 62-43 victory. The team will now travel to Upper Moreland (4-14, 0-9), Council Rock North (11-7, 8-3), and host rival Wissahickon (5-13, 2-7) to try and continue to improve playoff seeding.

Scoring

Taylor Bryant: 26
Jen Myers: 10
Lauren Rothfeld: 9
Brianna Spector: 8
Cutrena Goff: 4
Jackie Lillo: 2
Larissa Leyes: 2
Kayla Mcaneney: 1