Friday, January 6, 2012

By Rich Barton
NJS.com Staff Writer

Raquel Scott finished with a double-double for IHA, which used a late 15-1 spurt to put away Passaic Tech, 49-38, on Thursday afternoon.

WAYNE – IHA center Raquel Scott prides herself on being a leader. The senior is about as emotionally charged as any player in North Jersey and wears her heart on her sleeve at all times when on the basketball court. While her raw ability to grab rebounds and finish in the post has been evident since her freshman year, the maturity of Scott is what has taken her from a gifted player to one of the area’s elite. A prime example of that came on Thursday afternoon when facing a five-point deficit in the third quarter against Passaic County Tech in a game that could have easily slipped away from IHA Scott rose to the occasion on both ends and refused to let her team lose.

Scott scored eight of her game-high 17 points during a 15-1 run that catapulted IHA to 49-38 road win in Wayne.

“We were down, but we were far from done. We just had to make sure the game didn’t get out of hand,” said Scott, who will play next year at Holy Cross. “We didn’t handle their press as well as we would have liked, but we continued to believe in each other. For our team, all five players are interchangeable and when we work together, good things happen. Once we started working together, we got back into the flow of the game.”

Passaic Tech's Nikia Richardson finished with 12 points, tied for team high honors.

IHA got off to a hot start thanks to Taylor Anderson. She hit four of her first five shots, including consecutive jumpers, to give the Blue Eagles a quick 7-0 lead.

“We wanted to start strong and finish strong and we did that,” said Anderson. “Raquel draws double-teams all the time inside, so someone has to be open. Today it was me and I had to be aggressive both going to the basket and taking shots when I was open.”

After battling back to tie the game on three straight shots from Nikia Richardson, PCT countered by throwing on a 2-1-2 full-court press that paid immediate dividends. They forced consecutive turnovers in the backcourt, which led to layups by Kiana Briggs and Sierra McDuffie for the Bulldogs’ first lead of the game, 19-15. IHA answered back with six straight points to end the half, the last two coming on a layup by Lindsey Rogers that put IHA in front, 21-19, at the break.

“We were a little lucky to be leading at halftime after the stretch we had in the second quarter,” said IHA head coach Steve Silver. “When you turn the ball over in the backcourt twice in a row and it leads to easy layups, it’s a dangerous thing to have happen against a team as athletic as PCT. When our turnovers went down, our confidence went up. We saw both ends of the spectrum on how we’re capable of playing.”

Taylor Anderson hit four of her first five shots to help IHA get off to a fast start.

PCT forced three consecutive turnovers late in the third quarter and they all led to baskets. McDuffie scored on a putback, Richardson scored on a floater along the baseline, and Briggs capped the spurt with a mid-court steal and breakaway layup for a 32-27 lead with just under three minutes to play in the period.

That was the wakeup call the Blue Eagles needed as they began to figure out how to break the Bulldogs’ press and also limit them to one shot per possession on the defensive end.

Besides being able to finish at the basket, Scott also showed her versatility during the crucial run. She hit a 17-foot jumper and a pair of free-throws, she had a big block and finished off the run with a nifty no-look pass back to Tiffany Weisbrecker to cap the 15-1 run that gave IHA a 42-33 lead with two minutes to play.

“It’s always tough to lose, but you have to give credit to IHA because they can beat you in so many ways,” said PCT head coach Ron Austin. “They are consistently one of the best teams around and we battled with them the whole way. We feel like we’re right there, we just have to do some tweaking on both ends and we’ll be fine. Today showed us where getting closer to what kind of team we can be, but that we still have to work hard to get there.”

Sierra McDuffie finished with 12 points for Passaic Tech, which fell to 4-2 on the season.

Scott finished with a double-double consisting of 17 points and 10 rebounds, while Anderson added a career-high 17 points for IHA (5-1). Lindsey Rogers came off the bench to add eight points and two blocks. McDuffie and Richardson each had 12 points with Briggs adding 11 for PCT (4-2).

The reigning Bergen County champs know they have their work cut out for them if they want to stay on top. But they take each game as an opportunity to improve on their weaknesses; and that mentality comes right from their leader.

“It’s a big to come in here and get a win, but what is more important is that it’s a lesson learned,” added Scott. “We see what our strengths are and what our weaknesses are. That allows us to work on becoming a more polished, more consistent team in the long run. Every team is going to play as hard as they can against us, wanting to knock us off. We are prepared for that and staying poised is very important. I think we all stepped up when things weren’t going our way and we fought our way out it.”

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