Sunday, December 27, 2009

By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director

Chelsea Lombardi scored 25 of her team's 44 points as Pascack Valley improved to 4-0 with a 17-point win over Wayne Hills in the opening round of the Joe Poli Tournament.

HILLSDALE -- It was last season in the very holiday tournament that it hosts that the Pascack Valley girls basketball team was upset in the opening round and showed some of the vulnerabilities that would follow it through the rest of a good-but-not-Pascack-Valley-good season. But this year, the Lady Indians used the first round of the Joe Poli Tournament to further their early season success, which includes three lopsided wins over three quality opponents.

Make it four as Pascack Valley kept itself rolling behind a lights out shooting day from Chelsea Lombardi and a signature defensive performance in a 44-27 win over Wayne Hills on Saturday afternoon.

“It’s definitely a step up from last year when we got knocked out of the Joe Poli in the first round [by Holy Angels] and we really wanted to try to make up for that today and play our hardest,” said Lombardi. “It’s kind of hard to live up to all of the great teams that we have had here in the past, especially after last year, which was kind of a bad year for us. But we don’t think about that when we are out of the floor, we just go out and try to live up to the potential that this team has.”

Christie Cherup's foul line jumper with 1:04 left in the first half had WH to within 22-17.

If the first four games of the season are any indication, this year’s Indians have plenty of potential as it now has wins over Holy Angels, a state sectional finalist last season, Pascack Hills, the defending North 1, Group 2 state sectional champions, Glen Rock, the defending B-PSL King Division champion with all of its starters returning, and now a quality Wayne Hills team.

One win has been more impressive than the next and when Lombardi Alyssa Matos hit a turnaround jumper 1:56 into the game, Pascack Valley had the lead for good at 4-2 and, with the defense it has played so far this season, that was almost enough points. The Indians held Pascack Hills to just 14 points in its win last week and held Wayne Hills to three single digit quarters, including a two-point third quarter and 10 in the second half.

An efficient offense didn’t hurt either.

“We just guard them up the floor, so it is not like we are pressing or trapping. We are old school here and we are not doing anything differently than we have even done. We have to be able to lock down and play half-court defense, ” said Pascack Valley head coach Jeff Jasper. “Offensively, we need to execute well to perform well. We are not going to overpower anybody. We are a finesse-type team and it is a matter of being able to catch and pass, those are the two most important aspects for us, and put ourselves in a position to get high percentage shots.”

PV senior Terry Ely handed out six assists to go along with her six points.

By running off screens, Lombardi found herself in high-percentage shot situations for most of the game and she made them count. With her team leading 8-4, Lombardi went on a personal 7-0 run that ended with a steal and a layup and Pascack Valley’s first double digit lead, 15-4, with 1:11 left in the first quarter.

Pascack Valley (4-0) was up 21-9 when Terry Ely got free for an easy bucket off an inbounds play with 5:12 left in the second quarter, but Wayne Hills made a bid to get back in it shortly thereafter. Sam Litzky made two free throws to kick off an 8-1 run for the Patriots that ended with Christie Cherup’s foul line jumper as Wayne Hills pulled to with 22-17 with 1:04 left in the first half.

But Lombardi came to a jump-stop on the fast break and made the short bank shot to push the PV lead back to seven points at halftime and Lombardi scored four points in the 8-0 run that the Indians used to open the second half. When Lombardi knocked down a jumper from the baseline after another well-executed inbounds play, PV was up 32-17 and she scored the last five points of third quarter to put her team up 37-19 heading into the final period.

Wayne Hills' Erica Wills scored all six of her points in the first half.

“We came here for a reason. We wanted to see if we could compete at this level and we knew that it was going to be hard for us. It was no surprise, but we are young and we are trying to do some things later on in the season,” said Wayne Hills head coach Vinnie Porta, who is following the same script as last season when his team used its tough schedule to ready itself for a run to the North 1, Group 3 state sectional semifinals.. “This is where we want to be. The reason we made that run in the states last year was because we were battle tested, so I wanted to come back here and see what we could learn.”

The Patriots were held without a double digit scorer as Wills and Bridget Greenwald each scored six points to tie for team-high honors, while Litzky scored 3 of her 5 points from the free throw line and Cherup finished with a pair of field goals for Wayne Hills, which fell to 2-2 on the season and will play Pope John in the consolation round of the Poli Tournament on Monday.

Lombardi, who scored 23 of her game-high 25 points in the first three quarters, was the only player on either team to finish in double figures, but it wasn’t like Pascack Valley’s other players struggled on the offensive end. The Indians are schooled to find the open shooters and ride the hot hand, which was Lombardi on Saturday. Ely had 6 assists to go along with her 6 points, Matos added 6 points off the bench, Sara Tucci and Dana Amato each made field goals and Ali Moczarski accounted for PV’s other 3 points.

Alyssa Matos scored 6 points off the bench for PV.

Still unbeaten and relatively untested through the first four games, Pascack Valley will take on Holy Angels, the team that handed it its first round loss last year and the one it beat to open this season, in the tournament semifinals on Monday afternoon.

“Our team is full of guards and we have a lot of inexperienced players, but they have been watching for a long time and they have picked up everything that we are trying to do pretty quickly,” said Ely, a senior who can play four of the five positions on the floor. “We knew going into this season that every game is going to be difficult. The NBIL is always tough and even more so this season, this tournament is tough and we really have to work hard to get our wins. We beat Holy Angels already this season, but we know they are a good team and every game is different. It’s going to be another tough game.”

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