Fri. Mar 29th, 2024

For Tyrone\’s girls basketball team, the first minute-and-a-half of the third quarter last night at Pleasant Valley Gymnasium was the kind of frenetic spurt the Lady Eagles have become all-too-familiar with when playing the Lady Marauders.
Guilfoyle extended its defense full court, trapped the basketball, got into passing lanes, and turned the game up to a tempo well out of reach of Tyrone\’s comfort zone. And while in the bigger picture the brief surge was less than one-sixteenth of the total game, it was all BG really needed in its 52-38.
“This is a tough place to play,” said Tyrone coach Jim Swaney. “The crowd is right on top of you and they had a nice crowd that was into the game. And I think mentally, we just really lost our heads, for maybe only a minute-and-a-half, but we probably turned it over five or six times in that period, and it was tough coming back from that.”
Tyrone turned the ball over five times during Guilfoyle\’s rally – an 11-0 run that put the Lady Marauders ahead 36-19 by the 5:26 mark.
It was the kind of stretch Guilfoyle has inflicted on Tyrone on numerous occasions since joining the Mountain Athletic Conference in 2001. The net result for the Lady Eagles is an 0-9 record against the Lady Marauders, and a string of games that have been highly contested, and close for a while.
“We were just hoping we could get to the right spots in our pressure,” said BG coach Mark Moschella. “We wanted to force them into some situations they didn\’t want to be in. But I give a lot of credit to Tyrone because they battled right back. The score wasn\’t indicative of the way both teams played.”
Guilfoyle hiked its record to 3-1 overall, and 1-0 in MAC Section II play. Tyrone, meanwhile, fell to 3-2 (1-1 MAC) with undefeated Lewistown coming to the borough Friday night.
Like the Lady Marauders, the Lady Panthers have had Tyrone\’s number for some time – their winning streak against the Lady Eagles is now in its 12th season – and they will likely attempt to make the game more of an end-to-end matchup, rather than a half-court battle.
Guilfoyle used the strategy to perfection. While their patient half-court attack was effective – netting 5-foot-11 post Mary Forr 19 points and enabling the Lady Maraduers to build a 25-19 halftime lead – nothing worked like turning it into an up-and-down game. The approach neutralized the defense of Emily Lloyd and Emily Ingle – Tyrone\’s biggest strength – while limiting the offensive touches of leading scorer Emily McKenna.
“We wanted to make her work because she\’s a great player and she gets about 50 percent of their shots from the floor,” said Moschella. “So you have to have your eye on her and do the best you can do in contesting her shots. For the most part, we did that.”
McKenna was still able to end the game with a team-high 18 points, but the balance BG achieved by capitalizing off Tyrone turnovers was too much for the Lady Eagles to overcome. Tara Geishauser scored 12, including five in BG\’s third quarter run, Ashley Helsel added nine, and Amanda DeAntonio and Dani Williams scored five apiece.
Following Guilfoyle\’s quick start to the third quarter, Tyrone ended the period on a 9-0 run to cut the lead to 39-32 heading into the fourth quarter. A McKenna basket inside cut it to 39-34 before BG went to a spread offense to work time off the clock.
Over the last 7:12 of the game, the Lady Marauders made only two baskets from the floor, both on shots from Forr, but made 9 of 14 foul shots to put the game away.
Tyrone turned the ball over 11 times in the second half, as opposed to Guilfoyle\’s four. For the game, Tyrone committed 25 turnovers and BG 13.
“I think if you take away the turnovers, the score was probably where we wanted it to be,” said Swaney. “In our half-court defense, we were fine. Forr\’s going to get points, but we did a pretty good job defending the basketball. You just can\’t give good teams points that you can\’t defend, and that\’s what we did (with our turnovers).”
Tyrone led 7-3 midway through the first quarter after McKenna drained a three-pointer, and maintained an 11-10 lead at the end of the period after Tiffany Bradford and Liz Tepsic scored at the end of the frame.
But the first two minutes of the second quarter was a portent of things to come as the Lady Marauders began to extend their defense, first bringing DeAntonio up to guard McKenna full-court. The result was a 9-2 run to start the period that made it 19-13 by the 4:06 mark.
“I give Guilfoyle a lot of credit,” said Swaney. “They supplied a lot of pressure and we turned it over.”
HOOP NOTES: Tepsic led Tyrone with 10 rebounds … After being outrebounded by five in the first half, Tyrone regrouped to even the rebounding totals at 22-22 … Bradford and Tepsic each scored eight … McKenna has made at least one three-pointer in every game.
JUNIOR VARSITY
After trailing 25-19 at halftime, Tyrone rallied to lead in the second half against Guilfoyle in the preliminary game, but eventually fell 48-41.
Kayla Corle led the Lady Eagles with 13 points, while Megan Turiano added 11.
VARSITY
Bishop Guilfoytle 52 Tyrone 38
TYRONE – McKenna 7 3-6 18; Lloyd 2 0-0 4; Ingle 0 0-0 0; Bradford 4 0-2 8; Hoover 0 0-0 0; Tepsic 4 0-0 8; Bryan 0 0-0 0; Corle 0 0-0 0; Turiano 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 17 3-8 38.
BISHOP GUILFOYLE – Forr 7 5-9 19; DeAntonio 2 1-3 5; Williams 2 1-2 5; Geishauser 3 5-8 12; Helsel 3 3-4 9; Carroll 1 0-0 2; Wertz 0 0-0 0; Bowman 0 0-0 0; Conrad 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 18 15-26 52.
Score by Quarter
TYRONE 11 8 13 6 – 38
BISHOP GUILFOYLE 10 15 14 13 – 52
Three-point goals: Tyrone 1 (McKenna)
Bishop Guilfoyle 1 (Geishauser)
JUNIOR VARSITY
Bishop Guilfoyle 48 Tyrone 41
TYRONE 7 12 16 6 – 41
BISHOP GUILFOYLE 14 11 7 16 – 48

By Rick