Tyrone coach Jim Swaney and the Lady Eagles employed a game plan last night against Indian Valley that was rooted in familiarity and research.
It was simple: Offensively, attack Valley in the post where senior Joanna Turner gave the Lady Eagles a decided advantage over the smaller Lady Warriors and use long and rangy Marie DelBaggio to hound IV leading scorer Jen Quay in a man-to-man match-up.
But when it’s all said and done, all of the tape-viewing and game-plan-designing in the world doesn’t mean a thing unless you make shots, and against Valley the sum of Tyrone’s pre-game preparation rolled off the front of the iron.
And clanked off the back of the rim.
And clunked off the backboard.
Any way you can think of to miss a shot, the Lady Eagles did, and the closer they got to the basket, the worse it got.
Tyrone connected on just 17 of 50 shots from the floor, including nine of 27 in the paint, in a 47-44 loss to the Lady Warriors at the Tyrone Area High School gymnasium.
The loss dropped Tyrone to 9-8 overall and 1-2 in the Mountain League second cycle, while Valley improved to 11-6 and 2-1. The Lady Warriors’ victory avenged a December loss to Tyrone in Burnham.
“Defensively, we controlled the flow of the game in the first half,” said Tyrone coach Jim Swaney. “We should have been ahead by 16 if we could have just made two-foot shots.”
Indeed, if ever there was a time Valley was ripe for the picking, it was in the first half last night. Point guard Megan Hartman was still feeling her way around after spraining her ankle Wednesday against Williamsport and leading scorer Jen Quay was completely bottled up by DelBaggio.
But while the Lady Eagles ran their offense to perfection time and again, creating open jumpers and lay up chances, they rarely got the shots to fall.
“This wasn’t your typical Tyrone-Indian Valley game,” said Valley coach Roger Herto. “Both teams have been dealing with some injuries lately and I know they are a completely different team with Hilary (McNelis) in there. Hopefully, we will see each other again down the road.”
McNelis, who remains sidelined with a stress fracture in her foot, could have made a great impact on the game just by making a few lay ups. As it was, every starter on Tyrone’s roster missed at least two shots in the paint.
“No one is seizing control,” said Swaney. “I respect Roger a great deal but this is a game we should have won by 15. We gave up the same amount of points down there (in December) and we won by 12.”
But while Tyrone’s shooting misfortunes certainly damaged the Lady Eagles chances last night, the game wasn’t entirely decided by what Tyrone didn’t do. In the third and fourth quarters, Valley grabbed control behind the gutty play of Hartman, who directed the offense and made some big shots.
In the fourth, after Tyrone had rallied to trim an eight-point deficit down to five, Hartman swished a pair of three-pointers on back-to-back possessions to put the Lady Warriors ahead 36-25 with 6:02 left in the game.
The Lady Eagles then ran off seven straight to cut the deficit to six (40-34) with under three minutes remaining. They would eventually get it down to five before missing another shot from six feet.
Tyrone led the game early and thanks to first quarter threes from DelBaggio and Emily McKenna led 10-8 after the opening frame.
The lead grew to 14-8 in the second on four straight points from Joanna Turner but a 9-2 Valley run to end the half put the Lady Warriors ahead 17-16 at halftime.
Tyrone went ahead to start the third on a pair of Turner foul shots, but Valley scored 11 in a row, including a Hartman trey, to go up 27-18 with just over a minute to play in the period.
Hartman finished with a game-high 13 points.
“We didn’t really know what she would be able to give us for this game,” said Herto. “She’s a great player. Her foot speed was negated a bit by the injury, but she hit some very big threes.”
Turner led Tyrone with 11 points and 10 rebounds, while DelBaggio added 10 points and seven rebounds.
HOOP NOTES: Despite playing with a smaller line up that included only one player at 5-10, Valley outrebounded Tyrone 37-26. Lauren Schaaf led the way with nine boards, Jen Quay also grabbed nine, and freshman Allison Mitchell, at just 5-6, ripped eight … Quay, who this season eclipsed the 1,000-point plateau for her career, was held to just seven … Emily McKenna and Amber DelBaggio each cut through traffic at the end of the third and fourth quarters, respectively, to make long distance three-point baskets at the buzzer … Valley went 20 of 45 from the field.
JUNIOR VARSITY
Tyrone’s jayvee team battled back from a 16-4 first quarter deficit to pull within two late in the fourth quarter but feel to Indian Valley 33-31.
Kylie Wallace led Tyrone with a game-high 13 points, while Marissa Hoover added seven points and 10 rebounds.
INDIAN VALLEY 47, TYRONE 44
VARSITY
TYRONE – M. DelBaggio 4 1-2 10; Turner 3 5-6 11; A. DelBaggio 3 0-0 7; Haag 4 0-0 8; McKenna 3 0-0 8; Wallace 0 0-0 0; Bryan 0 0-0 0; Roth 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 17 6-8 44
3-POINT GOALS: McKenna (2), A. DelBaggio (1), M. DelBaggio (1)
INDIAN VALLEY – Hartman 4 2-6 13; Shellenberger 2 1-2 5; Harlacher 2 0-0 5; Mitchell 4 0-2 8; Tewksbury 3 1-2 7; Schaaf 1 0-0 2; Quay 2 2-2 7. TOTALS: 20 6-16 47
3-POINT GOALS: Hartman (3), Tewksbury (1)
I. VALLEY 8 9 11 19 – 47
TYRONE 10 6 7 21 – 44
JUNIOR VARSITY
TYRONE – Wallace 5 3-3 13; Stanton 0 0-0 0; Hoover 0 5-7 5; Ingle 2 0-0 5; Roth 3 0-0 6; Russell 0 0-1 0; Taylor 1 0-0 2; Lewis 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 11 8-11 31
3-POINT GOALS: Ingle (1)
INDIAN VALLEY – Gingerich 0 0-0 0; VanGrave 1 0-0 2; Leister 0 0-2 0; Miller 1 2-2 5; Collins 2 0-0 4; Warntz 4 0-0 11; Mundy 3 2-3 9; Bell 1 0-0 2. TOTALS: 12 4-7 33
3-POINT GOALS: Warntz (3), Mundy (1)
I. VALLEY 16 6 7 4 – 33
TYRONE 4 6 10 11 – 31
