HS Girls’ Basketball: Spartans down Haven in OT, capture Division I crown
North Schuylkill's Hannah Kane blocks a shot by Schuylkill Haven's Anna Schaeffer during Thursday's Schuylkill League Division I game at the Cesari-Hope Gymnasium (Photo by Mel Rose).
FOUNTAIN SPRINGS — North Schuylkill captured the Schuylkill League Division I girls’ basketball title Thursday night.
But it wasn’t easy.
Freshman Monica Selgrade scored five of her nine points in the extra session as the Spartans scored the game’s final 11 points to outlast Schuylkill Haven 65-57 in overtime at the Cesari-Hope Gymnasium.
The victory gives North Schuylkill (15-4, 13-0 D-I) its third straight Division I crown and 22nd since 1985. The Spartans earn a bye into the Schuylkill League semifinals and will play the winner of the Division II runner-up vs. Division I third seed quarterfinal on Tuesday, Feb. 11, at Martz Hall.
“It feels really good,” senior Hannah Kane said of winning the division title. The Spartans were picked to finish fourth in Division I in the T102SportsNow.com Schuylkill League Girls’ Basketball Preseason Coaches’ Poll.
“Everybody looked down on us this year just because we lost some good players last year,” she continued. “We’re doing really well as a team. This was a really intense game. We had to put the ball in the hoop at the end of the game.”
While North Schuylkill ended the night as division champions, Schuylkill Haven (15-5, 10-3) made the Spartans earn it.
The Hurricanes, who have already clinched a league playoff berth, overcame a 12-point, second-quarter deficit with an intense defensive effort that forced 16 turnovers in the second half.
Mckenna Runkle scored 23 of her game-high 29 points after halftime, including a driving layup with eight seconds remaining in regulation to force overtime. The sophomore forward also pulled down 14 rebounds.
“She’s tough. She’s been good for us all year,” Schuylkill Haven coach Tony Sanders said of Runkle. “She’s a tough matchup for other teams. She can handle the ball. She can step out and shoot jump shots. She can take it to the basket hard.
“We count on her to do things that most teams don’t have the luxury to do. She’s a tough player. Tough on defense, tough on the boards, she’s tough to handle.”
The difference in overtime was that North Schuylkill made its shots and Schuylkill Haven didn’t.
After Runkle gave Haven a 57-54 lead on a 3-pointer with 2:50 remaining, the Hurricanes missed their next five shots and didn’t score again.
“We had good looks. They just weren’t falling for us,” Sanders said.
Gianna Capone answered Runkle’s shot with a 3-pointer of her own to tie the contest at 57-57, then the Spartans scored two quick layups in transition, one by Selgrade, the other by Mya Conti.
A drive by Selgrade with 1:19 left made it 63-57. Selgrade and Conti then added free throws in the final minute to set the final margin.
Conti finished with a team-high 23 points while Kane had 11 rebounds.
Selgrade, a freshman, was key down the stretch, coming in when starting forward Jadelin Stitzer fouled out with 2:28 left in the fourth. She finished with nine points.
“Length,” North Schuylkill coach Rich Wetzel said of Selgrade. “It’s not so much her offense, we put her in there for defense because she’s very active and she’s longer than you think. Her leverage, she’s able to deflect a couple of things.
“She was able to get her hands on a couple of passes there and she was able to finish a couple of times when we needed it.”
The game had the intensity of a February contest at Martz Hall, from vocal fans in the stands to rough physical play on the court.
Each team took valuable lessons from the game. For North Schuylkill, the Spartans were outhustled and outplayed in the second half by the Hurricanes, something that didn’t sit well with Wetzel.
“We’ve played as hard or harder than every opponent, even the games we lost,” Wetzel said. “Today, they played harder than us.
“We can’t get outhustled. We can’t let teams play harder than us. We’re not good enough to win championships consistently being outplayed like that. They played harder than us, that’s the bottom line. I’m not good with that.
“If we can learn from this, I can live with this.”
For Schuylkill Haven, being able to keep its emotions in check and play with poise was something the Hurricanes did better as the game developed.
The teams were tied 10-10 after one quarter, then the Spartans went on a 14-2 run to build a 24-12 lead with 3:22 left in the first half. A steal and and-one layup by Ava Terefencko got Haven back in it as the Hurricanes sliced the deficit to 27-20 at intermission.
Runkle put on a show in the third quarter, scoring 13 of Haven’s 20 points in the frame. The Hurricanes opened the second half with a 14-4 spurt, taking the lead on a 3-pointer by Kylie Siket and going up 34-31 on a layup by Runkle.
After a 3-pointer by Kane tied it, the Haven bench became unglued when it felt the officials missed an out-of-bounds call that directly led to an uncontested layup by Conti at the other end.
Two technical fouls, the ejection of an assistant coach and four Conti free throws later, the Spartans were up 40-34.
“I thought we played tough, aggressive defense tonight,” Sanders said. “We took them to the wire and that’s a credit to our girls working hard.
“We have to learn to play through things … play through some tough calls and move on to the next play.”
To Haven’s credit, the youthful Hurricanes learned how to keep their emotions in check down the stretch and never quit.
North Schuylkill led 54-47 with 2:56 left but Haven rallied to tie it on a layup by Runkle, a 3-pointer by Siket and the game-tying drive by Runkle.
But in the end, it was the Spartans earning another division crown.
“I’m proud of what we did,” Wetzel said. “We had it circled in there. We marked each one off. We had 13 circled, 13 was the one we needed.”
