Villa Novans Grab Big Win

Smithfield came into Woonsocket holding a slight edge over the Villa Novans in the Division 1 North standings, but instead of a championship bout, fans were treated to a contest that took over three minutes to produce the first basket of the night.

Woonsocket’s Ashley Dubois laid one off the glass three minutes and eight seconds into the game to give the home team first blood on the scoreboard. Following Dubois's bucket, the Villa Novans would not look back and never trailed in this game, grabbing a 57-37 win over the Sentinels on Teacher Appreciation Night.

Smithfield would cut the lead to 16-15 on an Ashley Lasalandra steal, but that would be as close as they would get. Woonsocket dominated the rest of the half scoring 13 points to their opponents' 5, to close out the half up by nine (29-20.)

“Our first four possessions, we extended them the full 30 seconds, but we couldn’t get things going,” Woonsocket Coach George Coderre said. “This was a very big game and the girls were so jacked up they couldn’t concentrate.  Eventually they began to focus and things turned around.”

While Woonsocket would conclude the game with a balanced scoring attack, it was Kailey Fugere who led the pack in the first half scoring 11 of what turned into her game high, 19 points. Dubois would finish the game with 16 and Michelle Brayboy added 14, including 4 three-pointers, which seemed to come every time Smithfield started to gather a bit of momentum.

Early on, the Smithfield defense was stifling and in turn caused many a problems for the Woonsocket guards trying to bring the ball up court. The Sentinels capitalized on several turnovers, scoring easy lay-ups. Lasalandra would be the recipient of many steals and ended up with 8 points on the evening, while Meghan Reall was Smithfield’s top scorer with 13 in the loss.

For much of the game Woonsocket held a double digit lead, pounding the visitors on the boards, getting second and sometimes third chances for put backs.

“Smithfield is the one that usually does that against its opponents,” Coderre said. “We knew that we needed to match their intensity tonight if we were going to have any chance of winning and we did just that.”

The win puts Woonsocket at 10-5, while Smithfield drops to 9-3.  The Villa Novans will be back in action on Friday night when they host St. Rays on Senior Night as they look to inch closer to Smithfield in the standings.