Monday, February 20, 2006
The Steelers' 22-point victory was over the St. Joseph Spartans.
By BILL ALBRIGHT
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
BUTLER -- After sharing a WPIAL section championship, Farrell High's girls basketball team has set its sights on winning the WPIAL Class A title.
Monday night at the Butler High gymnasium, the Steelers took a first big step toward achieving their goal as they ran over the St. Joseph Spartans, 52-30, in the opening round.
"I thought the girls played solid basketball in the first half," said Farrell coach Ed Turosky. "They played with a lot of composure and that type of hard work pays off to get your victories.
Got complacent
"In the second half, we sort of lost a little of that composure when we got somewhat complacent, but I guess sometimes when you are winning by so many points, it is hard to keep your focus. The one thing we have to guard against is that you can't afford to do that when you are playing good teams in the playoffs."
The Steelers went after the Spartans with a man-to-man defense for the entire 32 minutes.
"I thought with their guards they didn't handle the ball real well," said Turosky. "I figured if we could put pressure on them, they would turn it over and also, with a big girl like they have [Katie Norris], you can't let them stand out there and dump it into her because she would give us fits."
The Steelers (17-5) took a quick 7-1 lead in the first four minutes of the game, but St. Joseph battled back to cut their deficit to a pair before Farrell closed out the opening period with a 7-0 run for a 14-5 lead after one quarter.
Pattern
"That is kind of the way we have been all season," said Turosky. "Clear back to the second game of the season when we played Slippery Rock, we have scored in spurts. We put in a press that helps us get some quick scoring and that kind of got our motor going tonight."
Midway through the second period, the Spartans (13-11) were still hanging around at 19-11, but that is when another Steeler spurt came along as Farrell scored nine unanswered points on the front end of an 11-2 run to close out the first half.
"They were able to hang around because they are a well-coached team," said Turosky. "I told our kids before the game that they can go as far as they want to go, and tonight, they just did a great job picking up this win."
Leading by as many as 26 (46-20) at the end of three periods, Farrell took care of business down the stretch to close out the win.
Rather keep scoring
"That [being patient down the stretch] has been one of the things we haven't worked on all year, but I thought we might need to do it in the playoffs," said Turosky. "We have the discipline to do it, but I personally would rather keep scoring rather than lay off because with kids at this age, that [laying back] many times causes a lot of mistakes."
Leading the Steelers was Chloe Stewart with 18 points and Dierica Blackwell with 11.