Wednesday,
January 16, 2008
By
Carl Nasman
NJS.com Multimedia Coordinator
CRESSKILL
-- There was plenty riding on Tuesday night’s BSCL-Olympic
Division girls basketball match-up, but a dead battery threatened
to hold up the entire proceeding. Cresskill and Dwight-Englewood
had to put their first place show-down on hold for 10 minutes
while the Cresskill scorers’ table replaced the batteries
in the public address microphone.
Once
that was sorted out and the lineups had been announced, the two
remaining undefeated squads in the BCSL Olympic went to work.
Dwight-Englewood
was playing for more than just first place. Senior guard Julia
Schneider came into the contest just 21 points shy of the career
school scoring record. Schneider came up short, netting 16 points,
and Cresskill pulled away from the Bulldogs in the fourth quarter
for a hard-earned 38-32 victory. The Cougars (8-2, 7-0) now stand
alone atop the BCSL-Olympic.
Cresskill
led 12-7 after the first quarter and tried to hold that lead with
a triangle and two defense to combat the explosive Schneider.
“We
knew that to win, we had to limit her opportunities,” said
Cresskill head coach Jennifer Rilli. “We knew she’d
get shots, we knew she’d make these great moves, she’s
an outstanding player, but we knew that in order to win we had
to hold her to as few points as possible,”
The
strategy seemed to rattle the Bulldogs (6-3, 5-1), especially
in the second half as Schneider managed just seven points, including
three in the fourth quarter. Whenever Schneider managed to get
past her defender, there seemed to be a shot blocker lying in
wait.
“This
is something different, we weren’t prepared for it. It’s
maybe not the toughest defense but it was the most confusing.
We did a lot of studying before the game, but we were not prepared
for it,” said Schneider.
The
Cougars were paced by Carly Cerone’s 10 points. Stephanie
Durakis added eight, while Sarah Malmut and Flo Borova chipped-in
seven each. Dwight-Englewood got strong performances from Amina
Lawrence and Anna Kaminsky who scored nine and seven points, respectively.
The
Cougars travel to Northern Highlands for a non-league match-up
on Thursday before wrapping up their first BSCL-Olympic rotation
on Tuesday with a home game against New Milford.
Schneider
needs just six more points to break Dwight-Englewood’s all-time
career scoring record of 1,282. She should get those six and more
when the Bulldogs host Bogota on Thursday night. Schneider would
have the highest career point total of any Bulldog player in history,
boy or girl.
Hear
all about it in this special NJS.com Audio Report!
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