L-L girls’ basketball notebook for Dec. 23

December 23rd, 2007 1:35 am · 0 comments

JEFFREY REINHART jreinhart@LNPnews.com

The first major checkpoint of any basketball season is upon us:

The holiday break.

And at this season’s holiday break, three of the four section races in the L-L League feature a tie.

SECTION 1 – Defending champ Cedar Crest and Hempfield are both 5-0. Black Knights are smoking hot, winners of nine in a row. Crest has won seven in a row, including an overtime thriller over previously unbeaten Lower Dauphin on Saturday.

SECTION 2 – Garden Spot has sole possession of the lead, the only team that can say that with Christmas bearing down on us (two calendar days left to shop, by the way. Better hurry). The Spartans are 3-2 in league games, a game clear of defending champ Conestoga Valley and Ephrata.

SECTION 3 – All kinds of stuff happening here already. Lampeter-Strasburg got off to a rip-roaring 8-0 start before falling to Manheim Central – which was 6-0 before falling to Lancaster Catholic. Meanwhile, Elco started off 3-0, had a league game postponed until January 5, then fell to L-S. So Central and L-S are 4-1 and Elco is in a virtual tie with the Pioneers and Barons at 3-1. Got it?

SECTION 4 – Incredible, incredible comeback back Lancaster Mennonite the other night, in the Blazers’ 45-40 win at Lancaster Catholic. I was at that game, and I’m still trying to figure out what happened to Catholic, which led 33-17 at the break, and then got all of one field goal (and seven points) in the second half, as Mennonite stormed from behind and won. Catholic (4-1) and Mennonite (4-1) are tied for first, two games ahead of my preseason pick, Lebanon Catholic. Pick it up, Beavers.

League play starts up again January 2.

More tidbits:

SCORING LEADERS: Twenty-six (26) players in the L-L League are averaging 10.0 or more points per game. Here’s the list, through Dec. 22:

(player, school, games, points, average)

Kelsey Caruthers, Penn Manor (10-212-21.2), Teasia Myers, McCaskey (7-119-17.0), Brittany Ryder, Lancaster Catholic (9-151-16.8), Nicky Hess, Donegal (8-132-16.5), Bekah Roland, Manheim Central (9-140-15.6), Lisa Boyer, L-S (10-151-15.1).

Allison Bauer, CV (10-141-14.1), Meghan Phillips, Cedar Crest (9-123-13.7), Hailey Carangelo, Lebanon Catholic (9-121-13.4), Nichole Heister, Northern Lebanon (10-133-13.3), Chrissy Taylor, Garden Spot (9-119-13.2), Dani Artman, Manheim Central (9-117-13.0), Analicia Evans, Hempfield (10-124-12.4), Shannon Stokes, Cedar Crest (9-112-12.4), Ana Cruz, Warwick (9-109-12.1), Samantha Carangelo, Lebanon Catholic (8-96-12.0).

CeCe Buzzard, Solanco (8-87-10.9), Aubrey Hoover, Cedar Crest (9-98-10.9), Melissa Sattazahn, Lebanon (9-97-10.8), Katie Lynch, L-S (10-107-10.7), Kelsey Curcio, Manheim Township (9-94-10.4), Jenna Proffitt, Manheim Central (9-94-10.4), Taylor Kreider, Solanco (8-82-10.3), Ashley Marshall, Pequea Valley (10-102-10.2), Katelyn Vanderhoff, Lancaster Mennonite (10-100-10.0).

WALKING WOUNDED: Huge loss for McCaskey last week when standout senior point guard Teasia Myers – a New Era All-Star and Section 1 All-Star pick last season – went down with a sprained right ankle last Monday against CV. Myers missed Wednesday’s Section 1 opener against Hempfield (Black Knights 42, Tornado 29) and last Friday’s section game against upstart Penn Manor (Comets 60, Tornado 29; Penn Manor led 16-0 after the first quarter, by the way). So yeah, McCaskey misses its floor general. No word on when Myers will be back in the lineup. Coach Brian McCloud told me he hoped to have her back when section play starts up against January 2. Myers told me she likely would not play Thursday when McCaskey takes on L-S in a much-anticipated first-round game in the Ephrata Holiday Tournament.

AND THEN THERE WERE NONE: There are zero undefeated teams in the league as we hit the holiday break. That does surprise me a little, to be honest. The last unbeaten team was L-S, which was 8-0 before falling to Manheim Central last Wednesday.

AND THEN THERE WAS ONE: Just one winless team in the L-L League these days – Elizabethtown, which limps to the holiday break 0-5 in league games and 0-8 overall. Annville-Cleona was 0-9 before the Little Dutchmen held off Pequea Valley 48-42 last Friday to pick up their first W.

DOUBLE-DIGITS: For the trip to Florida and all that cash (um, not really), who are the only four L-L League players to score at least 10 points in a game in every game so far this season? If you said Penn Manor’s Kelsey Caruthers (10-for-10), Cedar Crest’s Meghan Phillips (9-for-9), Donegal’s Nicky Hess (8-for-8) and McCaskey’s Teasia Myers (7-for-7 before suffering an ankle injury), you would be correct. Nice work.

TRIPLE PLAY: For the trip to Disneyland and all that cash (um, not really), who are the only two L-L League players who have hit at least one 3-pointer in every game so far this season? If you said Northern Lebanon’s Nichole Heister (10-for-10; league-best 29 treys) and Donegal’s Nicky Hess (8-for-8), you not only would be correct, but you are one smart cookie.

FROM WAY DOWNTOWN … BANG: Here are the leading 3-point shooters in the L-L League heading into the holiday break:

Nichole Heister, Northern Lebanon (29), Dani Busansky, Penn Manor (20), Nicky Hess, Donegal (20), Carmen Cruz, Warwick (17), Chrissy Taylor, Garden Spot (17), Allison Bauer, CV (16).

Molly Holt, Lancaster Catholic (13), Tessa Smucker, Pequea Valley (11), Samantha Carangelo, Lebanon Catholic (11), Ana Cruz, Warwick (10), Kelsey Curcio, Manheim Township (10), Emily Nobile, Columbia (10).

MILESTONE ALERT: CV senior guard Allison Bauer is inching toward the 1,000-career-point plateau. Heading into the Buckskins’ games in the Warwick Holiday Tournament this week, Bauer is sitting on 965 points.

She’s poised to become the third L-L League player already this season to eclipse 1,000 points: McCaskey’s Teasia Myers and Penn Manor’s Kelsey Caruthers both joined the club earlier this season.

There are 11 other active L-L League players with 500 or more career points: Samantha Carangelo, senior, Lebanon Catholic (886), Bekah Roland, senior, Manheim Central (743), Lisa Boyer, junior, L-S (725), Kelsey Gorman, senior, Lancaster Mennonite (715), Tori Aston, senior, Columbia (709), Analicia Evans, senior, Hempfield (655), Katelyn Vanderhoff, junior, Lancaster Mennonite (641), Nicky Hess, junior, Donegal (634), Cherelle Simmons, senior, McCaskey (611), Aubrey Hoover, senior, Cedar Crest (603), Brynn Lyons, senior, Ephrata (561), CeCe Buzzard, senior, Solanco (540).

Aston, by the way, had a whopper of a game for Columbia last Wednesday, scoring 18 points, grabbing 18 rebounds and forcing 5 steals in the Crimson Tide’s 62-50 loss to Pequea Valley.

NOTES: Hottest defense in the league? Hempfield. In their last nine games (all wins), the Black Knights are yielding just 31.1 points a game. In those nine games, the most points Hempfield allowed was 44. That’s the only time a team cracked 40 on the Knights during their winning streak. Hempfield held Elizabethtown to 14 points on Dec. 1. … Kelsey Caruthers continues to amaze at Penn Manor. The St. Francis University recruit has scored in double digits in every game this season, with a season-low of 14 points (in a 56-44 loss to Cedar Crest last Wednesday). But she bounced back with 22 points in the Comets’ 60-29 demolition over Teasia Myers-less McCaskey on Friday. Caruthers has eight 20-plus-point games already this season, with a league-high 30. … I featured Warwick’s Cruz identical twins (juniors Carmen and Ana) in my Section 1 season preview. Glad I picked them. What a start for the Warriors’ cat-quick backcourt: Ana (12.1, 10 3-pointers) and Carmen (7.4, 17 3-pointers) have combined for 27 treys, and Warwick is well within shouting distance of Cedar Crest and Hempfield, and is 6-3 overall, meaning the Warriors need just six more wins to become district-playoff eligible for the second season in a row. … A couple of Pequea Valley players have been burning up the nets recently: junior G Tessa Smucker (7.3, 11 3-pointers) and freshman G Marissa Ferris (6.6, 9 3-pointers) have been stepping it up for second-year coach Melissa Mabry. Smucker had 21 points in PV’s win over Columbia, and she’s averaging 17 points with 5 3’s in her last two games. Ferris has hit double-figures three times, and she has seven 3-pointers in her last four games. Don’t forget: PV goes up to Triple-A in Districts starting next season. … In her last eight games, Northern Lebanon junior G Nichole Heister is averaging 15.0 points with 25 treys.

COVERAGE: Looks like I’ll be at Hempfield on Wednesday for the first round of the Hempfield Holiday Tournament – host Knights take on Lancaster Mennonite in the opener, followed by Lancaster Catholic-Dallastown. Thursday I’m headed to Ephrata for the first round of the Ephrata Holiday Tournament. L-S will take on McCaskey in the first game, followed by Mounts-Elco in the nightcap. Curious to see if Myers plays for the Tornado. If not, L-S might have too much speed for the Tornado. Myers or not, that would be a signature win against a perennial Section 1/Quad-A power for the Pioneers. If any games catch my fancy on Friday, I’ll probably be out and about. Great games coming up the week after when we return to league play, including a pair of testers fom Cedar Crest: Hempfield and McCaskey. Stay tuned for that.