The Fenwick girls basketball team was felled by its own strategy at Benet on Saturday afternoon. The Friars, who rely heavily on the three-point shot, lost to the Redwings 67-66 on a buzzer-beating trey by Benet’s Madeline Eilers.
With three seconds on the clock, Christen Prasse found Eilers down court and the senior launched a shot from behind the arc. The bucket stunned the Friars, who held more than a decade old winning streak over their East Suburban Catholic Conference rival.
“We were in the wrong defense at the end of the game and I had a timeout and didn’t use it, so I have to take the hit on this one,” said Fenwick head coach Dave Power. “We didn’t finish the game and you have to finish the game.”
The Friars launched 27 three-pointers, but only made seven. Led by the return of senior center Meredith Boardman, who had sat out two games previous to Friday’s match-up for violating school rules, Fenwick (6-2, 1-1) held a 33-24 advantage by halftime. But accurate free-throw shooting (18-of-20 in the game) and a 10-0 run in the fourth helped Benet gain the upper hand.
The Yale-bound Boardman finished with 21 points and 12 rebounds, while Jade Owens added 15 points and Marek Burchette chipped in 11.
While the Friars didn’t exactly shoot all that well in their ESCC opener against Carmel on Dec. 7, they made enough buckets to upend the Corsairs 61-41.
The Friars took a 13-12 lead after the first quarter and expanded the advantage to 28-21 by the break. Fenwick did most of its damage by forcing turnovers, 42 in all for the game. By the third quarter, the team held a commanding 48-30 lead.
But not all was clicking for the Friars, who made a paltry 7-of-41 three-point attempts and missed 16 layups.
“We’re not getting enough shooting reps in practice,” said Power in regards to his team’s poor accuracy against Carmel. “We have been spending most of our time working on structure. The thing we got back to doing well is getting off shots, but when we’re wide open we’re rushing, we need to slow that down.”
The Friars bombarded Carmel with 75 attempted shots on the night. Junior Maggie Reilly led the Friars with 19 points, while Owens finished with 13. Paige Corvino and Burchette each chipped in seven points apiece, while Maya Garland pocketed six steals. Eva Brundage hauled down 11 rebounds for the Friars, who head up the street to take on cross-town rival OPRF tonight (Wednesday, Dec. 14, 7 p.m.).
Fenwick hosts Nazareth on Thursday (7 p.m.) and travels to Bishop McNamara on Saturday (3:30 p.m.).
