Tuesday, December 27, 2011

By Rich Barton
NJS.com Staff Writer

Madison Dunbar and Northern Highlands improved to 4-0 by holding off Ridgewood, 54-52, in the opening round of the Holiday Hoop Jam at River Dell on Monday.

ORADELL – The Northern Highlands girls basketball team knew it had all the pieces in place to have a great start to the season. With three wins over quality opponents to start the season, all by at least 22 points, only a couple of questions remained.

How would the Highlanders’ complementary players play when opponents were able to limit standout center Jackie Reyneke and emerging point guard Madison Dunbar? Also, how would the Highlanders respond when they finally played a close game against a hungry opponent? Both questions were answered on Monday at the River Dell Holiday Hoop Jam when the Highlanders went right down to the wire against Ridgewood.

Sonya West scored seven straight points in the fourth quarter to give the Highlanders the lead for good and they were able to withstand a furious rally late to stay undefeated with a 54-52 quarterfinal victory over Ridgewood at River Dell High School.

“This was a big test for us and we can breathe a sigh of relief that we got out of here with a win,” said Reyneke, a 6-foot-3 junior. “It was a little crazy for awhile, but when we settled down, we got into our high-low offense and got better looks at the basket. Controlling tempo was key today and this was the tough game we needed.”

Point guard Lauren Beausoleil made a steal and a layup to give Ridgewood its first lead early in the fourth.

Northern Highlands started off the game on a tear as Tori Balzano hit two three-pointers and Madison Dunbar had two steals and coast-to-coast layups for an 11-2 lead. Ridgewood struggled to get into a rhythm for most of the game, but the Maroons did a solid job defensively to cut the lead to 23-18 at the half and hang around long enough until someone got hot.

Normally that would be Temple-bound sharpshooter Meghan Roxas or athletic forward Kelci Smesko. But with Smesko being held in check in by Reyneke and Roxas picking up her fourth foul midway through the third period, it was steady point guard Lauren Beausoleil who gave the Maroons the much-needed offensive spark. She lit up the nets in the third quarter with four jumpers that all hit nothing but net, including a three-pointer. A minute into the fourth, Beausoleil made a steal at midcourt and scored on a driving layup to give Ridgewood its first lead of the game, 40-39.

The score was tied at 45 with less than five minutes to play when the Highlanders faced their first crisis moment of the season. West came up huge for the Highlanders with two layups and a conventional three-point play followed by a layup from Arista Meneve to make it 54-45 with two minutes to go.

“Jackie, Madison, and Tori (Balzano) draw so much attention from defenses that it allows me to get open easier,” said West. “I thought we lost control of the game a little in the third quarter, but we still had time left and we stayed composed. The most important thing we did was take care of the ball. When we took care of the ball, good things were happening.”

It seemed to be lights out for the Maroons down nine with less than two minutes to play, but they continued to get up off the deck and had one last run left in them. They forced three consecutive turnovers and each time Smesko was fouled and went to the charity stripe, going 5-of-6 to cut the lead to 54-52. A missed front end of a one-and-one gave the Maroons a chance to tie the game or win it with just seconds remaining. Roxas got a look on the wing from three over the outstretched hand of Reyneke, but the shot hit off the front of the rim and the Highlanders escaped with a victory.

Arista Meneve made a layup to put Highlands up 9 with two minutes to play in the game.

“All you want at the end is a chance to win the game and we had it,” Ridgewood head coach Meaghan Palmer. “I thought we did a much better job in the second half of attacking their 3-2 zone being they had a big size advantage, but we dug ourselves a hole too many times and we didn’t have enough time to get out of the last one.”

Reyneke had 17 points and 15 rebounds for Northern Highlands (4-0). West led all scorers with a career-high 18 points.

Beausoleil had a season-high 16 points, 14 in the second half, and Smesko had 10 of her 14 points in the fourth quarter for Ridgewood (1-3).

Northern Highlands will face a familiar foe in the semifinals when they face league rival Ramapo. It will be the second of at least three meetings they will have this season.

“Ramapo is always a challenge we look forward to,” added West. “This season, we’ve gotten off to a real good start. But we have high goals and we definitely don’t want to peak too early. We found a way to win today even though we turned the ball over a lot. If we want to beat Ramapo and win the tournament, we have to take care of the ball better and just play better overall than we did today.”

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