By Jeff Reinhart
In the opener at Milton Hershey on Wednesday, District 1 champ Gwynedd Mercy put on a defensive clinic, and despite not scoring a single point in the fourth quarter, the Monarchs stifled District 3 No. 3 Greencastle-Antrim by a 39-22 count.
The Blue Devils shot 7-for-38 — and just 5-for-20 from 3-point land — from the floor, and G-A had just four buckets after the first quarter and finished up 24-4 overall after winning the Mid-Penn Colonial crown for the third year in a row and going to the District 3 semifinals.
Gwynedd Mercy, now 24-4 overall, gets District 12 champ Archbishop Wood in a Class 3A Elite Eight game on Saturday; Wood (22-6) knocked out District 4 champ Danville on Wednesday.
The Blue Devils got off to a fast start, with Meghan Hirneisen drilling a pair of first-quarter 3’s, and Hannah Crist also hit from downtown as G-A took a 7-0 lead against Gwynedd Mercy, which rallied behind Tufts recruit Erica DeCandido, who scored seven of her game-high 19 points in the second quarter.
Armed with a 13-11 lead heading into the second quarter, the Monarchs put the clams on defensively, bottling up G-A at the 3-point line and not letting Crist or Jenay Faulkner get any cozy looks.
Faulkner, who came into the game averaging 20 points with 99 3-pointers, hit a free throw on the Blue Devils’ first trip to give G-A a 1-0 lead. Amazing, she wouldn’t score again; Faulkner had one point and seven rebounds, and finished her standout junior season with 99 3’s.
Gwynedd Mercy, which won the rebounding margin 35-25, held G-A to one second-quarter bucket — Morgan Wagaman’s hoop cut the Monarchs’ lead to 17-13 — and the Blue Devils had just nine second-half points on three field goals, including 3’s by Crist and Hirneisen.
And that was it.
Up 39-19 heading into the fourth, Gwynedd Mercy was content with going stall-ball, and played keep-away for literally minutes at a time. The Monarchs didn’t score at all in the fourth, and still won by 17 points.
Brigit Coleman added 11 points for Gwynedd Mercy, while Hirneisen paced G-A with 10 points,
as the Monarchs held Faulkner and Crist — two of deadliest snipers in the midstate — to eight points combined.
QUOTABLE: Greencastle-Antrim coach Mike Rhine — “They kind of hit us in the face — really hard — right away with their defense. We did have a beautiful start; our kids were ready to play and they played really well right away. But they kept running kids at us and they played great defense and they moved the ball really well. Give them credit; I thought our kids did the best they could. I’m sad the game ended like that for our seniors because those are some of the best kids you could ever have. We just didn’t have enough. They were better than us.”
QUOTABLE: Gwynedd Mercy’s Erica DeCandido — “We knew coming in that they were going to shoot 3’s all day, so we put our best defensive players on their best offensive players. And just like the saying goes: Offense might win you some games, but defense wins you championships. We really put it together and it was a total team win.”
QUOTABLE: Gwynedd Mercy coach Tom Lonergan — “We knew we had to pick it up defensively and we were able to get into our full-court game, and I thought that wore them out. We did get down early, but we stuck with our game plan, which was to pressure them and speed them up and I think that was the difference. I never dreamed that we would keep Faulkner and Crist both under 20, but we have one of the better defensive teams in our area. We’re only giving up like 32 points a game playing a really tough schedule.”
