Saturday, December 29, 2001
By GARY HOUSTEAU
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
CANFIELD -- Although the Ursuline High girls basketball team began the fourth quarter with a five-point lead and finished the contest with 60-53 victory over Canfield, the game Thursday was up for grabs as late as midway through the final period.
The score was tied at 50 when sophomore Courtney Davidson of Ursuline took matters into her own hands.
Davidson, who had the hot scoring hand throughout the game and led all scorers with 28 points, hit consecutive 3-point shots late in the fourth period to lead the Irish to the hard fought victory.
But it was the second one that had the biggest impact.
"I knew we had to get a lead so we could finish it off and maybe get them to foul us, and so I just was feeling it and I just took it," said Davidson, who finished the game shooting 11 of 24 with five 3s. "I know I have a team to back me up no matter what. I know they need me and I need them and it's just a team effort. We all have to come together and play."
After the two teams played to a 29-29 tie at the half, Canfield fell behind late in the third, trailing by seven at 46-39 with 2:24 remaining in the period, but it made a run at Ursuline to start the fourth quarter.
"We weren't happy with the way we played in the first half, but I thought we played much better in the third quarter," said Ursuline coach Sean Durkin. "But a team like Canfield is going to make a run at you, you know it, and it was just a great fourth quarter. We just had a little more left at the end."
The Irish had a five-point lead at 46-41 to start the fourth period when Canfield went on a 6-0 run to take a 47-46 lead with 5:37 remaining in the game.
Sophomore Corey Hoffman had two quick field goals to start the scoring in the period for the Cardinals. Davidson stopped the run with one of her three buckets in the fourth period, this one being a two-pointer, to retake the lead 48-47 with 5:16 on the clock. After a pair of free throws first by Erin Martin of Canfield and then Mahogani Graves of Ursuline, the Irish led 50-49 with 4:39 left. Canfield's Jill Vertanen then connected on a pair of tosses from the charity stripe, after missing a pair just before that, to give the Cardinals a 51-50 lead 3:41 remaining in the game. Davidson then buried her fourth three-pointer of the game to give Ursuline a 53-51 right before Nicole Vlajkovich, who scored 12 points on six field goals, answered with a quick basket but missed the ensuing free throw when she was fouled, to tie the score at 53 with 2:28 left in the game. Ursuline tried to work the ball around to Davidson, who after some nifty dribbling, drained a falling-away three pointer from between the circles under tight coverage, to give the Irish a 56-53 lead and consequently enough points with that basket to win the game.
"That was a very big shot," Durkin said. "It was a nip-and-tuck game, going back and forth, they would lead and we would lead, and she hit that huge three and that kind of put momentum on our side."
After the Irish got the ball back with the three-point lead, they were trying to run the clock down when a wide-open Ashley Parry hit her only basket of the game from just inside the three-point line in the corner, obviously going against the game plan.
"I was looking to pass it, we only had a minute left and we weren't looking to do much," Parry said . "(Durkin) said to stall the ball and spread the floor out and that's what we did. But I was wide open and I just looked at the hoop and I stroked it."
Parry said she was more nervous after taking the shot.
"Thank God I made it because he would have killed me," she said with a smile.
The bucket gave Ursuline a 58-53 lead with 1:04 remaining on the clock.
"She came off and I told her 'you were lucky you made it,' " said Durkin, who was able to laugh about it after the game. "That was it, lucky you made it, that's all I had to say."
The Irish sealed the victory when Christina Cook, who scored 10 points and five rebounds, broke away for an easy lay-in off of a backcourt inbounds pass, with 44 seconds left to play.
"They were the better team tonight, it was pretty obvious I thought," said Canfield coach Pat Pavlansky. "Sure they hit some big shots, but I really felt all game long that they beat us on the boards so bad that if we were going to win tonight we were going to have to steal it. They outworked us on the boards all night long and if you don't rebound the basketball, you're not going to be very successful. We didn't rebound tonight, they did, they won the game."
Durkin was pleased with the performance of his big people inside as well. The Irish out rebounded the Cardinals 33-26, as Sarah McKelvey had 10 boards and Graves had nine to lead the way for Ursuline. Davidson also added five boards to the total with three of those on the offensive end.
"I was very happy with the way our bigger girls played tonight," he said. "I thought they worked real hard inside and they made some big baskets and got some big rebounds and big situations."
The win should give the Irish (5-2) some momentum going into their match-up with perennial power, Bedford Channel on Saturday.
"Hopefully we can use this game to kind of vault us into a little bit of a run here," Durkin said.