Albert Gallatin girls race past Connellsville
CONNELLLSVILLE -Albert Gallatin gave head coach Shea Fleenor an early Christmas gift with a 52-29 win over Connellsville in a girls Section 2-AAAA game Thursday night. Before the game the Colonials’ coach mentioned how he would like to leave the gym with a 4-0 Section mark going into the Christmas break, and the Lady Colonials delivered the early present with a 52-29 win over the Lady Falcons.
Albert Gallatin (7-2,4-0) rode another strong performance from senior Loui Hall. The six-foot forward powered her way to 36 points and 20 rebounds. Her only mistakes were committing two fouls. Outside of that, she was the show, hitting three from the 3-point line, eight field goals and was a perfect 11-of-11 from the foul line.
Take away her performance and Connellsville wins 29-26.
Fleenor would like to see some other players step up, and take some of the load from Hall, but says she has earned her way to be a go-to player. “Loui is carrying a lot of the load for us, but she has worked hard to get to that point,” Fleenor said. “She’s not forcing anything, she’s taking good shots and works hard on the offensive glass. She’s been a warrior to this point, the way she’s been working in games.”
The Lady Falcons (3-6, 1-3) did a good job of executing their game plan early in the game, slowing the ball down on offense, working for good shots and playing good defense. “They played right into our hands early in the game,” Connellsville coach Bob Renzi said. “We wanted to hold the ball and get a good look at the basket, but we didn’t take good shots when we had the chance.”
Shane Guerriere opened the scoring with a three for AG, before Christine Salandra came back to score for Connellsville. The Lady Falcons patiently worked the ball in the first quarter, but could not find many lanes to the basket. Albert Gallatin picked up two baskets from Hall and another from Rachel Karpency to edge out to a 9-3 lead after the first quarter.
In the second quarter, Hall started to take over the game, with three baskets and a three-pointer for nine points in the quarter. Karpency added three, and Mallory Adamovich had a field goal as the Colonials outscored the Falcons 14-5 in the quarter to open up a 23-8 lead at the half.
“Our girls have played good defense this year, and they did a good job against Hall at times tonight. The doubled down on her and blocked a couple of her shots,” Renzi said. “We need to learn when we have the opportunity to drive to the basket; we’ve got to take it in strong. Until we get our offense on track we’re going to struggle.”
The Lady Colonials break the game open with a 25-8 run, courtesy of 19 points from Hall in the quarter.
She hit two three’s. Then she hit three more buckets from the field and was 7-of-7 from the foul line. Karpency added six points for AG in the quarter to make the score 48-16 after three.
“We cleaned up our defensive play in the third quarter by not giving Connellsville any second chances offensively, ” Fleenor said. “I’ve got to give credit to the girls. This was a big game for us. It puts at 4-0 going into the Christmas break, and gives us a little cushion in the Section.”
Hall scored AG’s only points in the fourth quarter, hitting all for chances from the line. She sat down briefly in the fourth quarter with the Lady Colonials ahead by 34.
The Lady Falcons made a little run in the final quarter to close out the game, outscoring the Colonials 13-4 with the reserves going most of the way.
In addition to Hall the only other player in double figures was teammate Karpency with 11.
Salandra led Connellsville with seven.