Worth the Wait!

How an Insanely Delayed Playoff Schedule Ended Wonderfully

by Jim Charles

(08-02-2011)

 

Left to right: Caravel's Yasmin Walker guards a streaking Emma

Matthews (Padua) who is making a left side tack to the basket.

 

The finale to this year's New Castle County Summer League witnessed heat-outs (Hockessin PAL), rainouts (Del-Tech), and lockouts (Caravel).  The exasperation that league coordinator Phil Sanderson must've felt was enough to turn most people's hair white.  In the end, Phil kept his cool (somehow) and the league concluded - at long last - with two nice championship games on Monday night.

 

Gold Division Finals

Delaware Military Academy 36, Delcastle 12

 

This game went nothing like we in the DGB.com broadcast booth thought it would go.  Not that we thought Delcastle would win, but we did think the game would be competitive.  How uncompetitive was it?  The score was 23 - 4, Seahawks, at halftime.  Worse, the Monday Club Ballers (the name Delcastle played under) did not score an actual basket from the floor until the second half when the game was 31 minutes old!  The player that notched the bucket, Shakera Wooten, would add a 3-pointer and two free throws for a respectable total of 7 points.  However, no other Delcastle player would have a field goal, nor more than 2 points.

 

On the DMA side of the ledger, a total of 6 players scored.  Pacing the offense were Leigh Ann Lennon and Renada L'Italien with 13 points each.  Lefty Liz Bates added 4, and three other players chipped in two apiece.  Lennon is as steady and smooth as they come.  She makes a nice on-court rallying point for her teammates.  As for L'Italien, enough cannot be said regarding the type of player she's become.  She's blessed with great shooting ability.  If there's a knock on her, offensively, it would be that she's a little too unselfish.  When her shot is on, like it was Monday, why not keep playing the hot hand?  Defensively, she excels at man-to-man.  Renada will study her opponent looking for weaknesses in ball handling.  If she senses a vulnerability, she wastes no time in appropriating the ball.  Years ago when we found her, we could see the promise.  We could see the potential.  Well, in L'Italien's case, tomorrow is here.

 

It bears saying that DMA, as a team, played great ball.  And Delcastle's anemic scoring production had more to do with solid pedal-to-the-metal team defense from DMA than any failing on their part.  DMA simply took too many areas of the court away from Delcastle.

 

Congratulations Seahawks!

 

Blue Division Finals

Caravel 34, Padua 33

 

The Blue Division is the NCCo Summer League's premier conference.  It features teams from the larger schools and teams with a history of doing well in winter ball.  As such, a team winning the Blue Division Title could fairly claim the overall League Championship.

 

This game started out good and simply kept getting better and better.  The game was knotted up at 13 all at halftime.  Deep in the second half, Padua ran out to a 9-point lead and things really looked bad for the Lady Bucs.  But somehow they rallied and clawed back into it.  Tempo was fast-paced on both sides, and that seemed the speed that both rosters preferred.  When either team tried to intentionally slow things down, you could see uncomfortableness creep in.  It was almost as if both teams wanted to tell their coaches, "Just let us play, okay?"

 

With 21 seconds to go, Caravel held onto a 32 - 31 lead.  Caravel inbounded, took the ball the length of the court only to miss a shot.  Padua gained possession which resulted in a Tiara White basket that put Padua ahead 33 - 32.  There must've been 10 seconds or less of game time left when Caravel got the ball back.  They went the length of the court, and, with about one second left, Yasmin Walker threw up a scoop shot layup in traffic that went in as the buzzer sounded.  Caravel wins by a point!  The Walker "Shot Heard Round the County" had, perhaps, more advance thought put into it than most spectators might imagine.  Yasmin did, after all, resort to the somewhat unorthodox and harder to pull off scoop attempt.  But, she had defenders on her.  And that type of shot tends to be, historically, one that is a foul magnet.  Maybe Walker thought, as time was running out, "Just let me draw a foul.  If I miss the shot, I got two chances from the line to either win the game or send it into OT."

 

There were great individual efforts along the way.  For the Pandas, Tiara White had a very good game contributing 11 points to the cause.  Not far behind was Emma Matthews with 8 points.  Five other Pandas tickled the scoreboard.  For Caravel, the inimitable Caroline Davis joined DMA's Lennon and L'Italien as leading scorers of the night with 13.  A whisper behind her was fellow post player, Olivia Gumbs who had 11.  Yasmin "Yaz" Walker had 7 points on the night, which included the aforementioned game winner at the buzzer.

 

This was a fantastic Blue Division final game!  It rivals last year's overtime Finals between St. E's and St. Mark's.  Congratulations to Caravel!  Major, major props to Padua for coming oh so close and for playing a more than solid game.

 

Seems like every summer we find a "new" player to rave about.

In 2011, that player was rising junior, Delcastle's Gabriella Spitelli.

 

Nice action pic of Leigh Ann Lennon and Spitelli going for the ball.

 

Briana Williams is one of a bunch of good Cougar guards.

 

Lefty Liz using her strong hand for DMA.

 

Renada L'Italien goes airborne on this jumpshot.

 

How about them 2011 Gold Division Champions!!!

 

DGB.com's first (and so far only) banner player, Padua's Hailey Lawler.

Hailey had 3 points on the night.

 

Caravel's Heather Wiley

 

Padua's Julianne Lambert in deep thought.

Maybe one day we could set up a baseline-to-baseline dash between

Julianne and Sanford's Amber Genwright.  Both ladies can MOVE.

Lambert had 4 points on the night.

 

Substitute coach Kate Mills sat out Yasmin Walker (above) for a long stretch of the

second half.  Walker wasn't in foul trouble.  Mills just wasn't aware of what a presence Yaz

is.  Finally, Yaz was reinserted into the lineup, a move that may have changed Caravel's status from

runner-ups to champions.

 

Emma Matthews came to Padua from the prestigious Matthews Academy, Class of '10.

Great all-around player.  Nice size.  May not look like it, but Emma is master of the "bang-bang" play.

Classic example from the stands:  "What's everybody cheering about?"  "Emma Matthews just scored."

"What?!?  I was watching the game the whole time!"  "It happened when you blinked."

 

Olivia Gumbs was most impressive underneath and will be a great help to Caroline Davis.

 

Victoria Boyd (with the ball) is as hard a worker as there is in the sport.

I coached her when she was in 5th grade and have followed her ever since.

Never, not once have I known her to slack off or take it easy at practice or in a game.

 

This was not the winning shot at the end of the game, but you can see Yasmin's form as she

readies an underhanded scoop shot.

 

Here is a composite of three images from one play.  Unfortunately, you'd need about another 7 or 8 frames

to see what a spectacular basket this turned out to be.  Using a combination of moves that most players her age

can't pull off, Davis worked her way around the basket to tuck the ball in on the left side.  Note how in the first

frame, defenders are behind her, still catching up to her.  In the middle frame, they're all over her.  In the third frame,

it looks like Caroline is warming up by herself as she finishes the shot.  Her moves were so devastating that

she literally cleared the floor of Padua jerseys without touching a single girl.

I said to our crack DGB.com staff (Dennis & Tom), "That was 'big girl' move!!!"

 

 

The final 21 seconds of a thrilling Title Game!

 

Much praise to the Lady Bucs of Caravel Academy for winning the Blue Division Cup!