Pirates Hold Off Lancers to Remain Unbeaten in Freedom

After a week off, the Pirates hosted the Lancers for a key Freedom Division battle on Thursday night in a battle of two-loss teams that were undefeated in the Freedom Division.

The Pirates staved off a late Lancers rally to come away with a 43-39 victory to move to 8-2 overall and 4-0 in the division.

“I don’t love it, but I also think it helped us a little because we were a little banged up,” head coach Bret Jenkins said. “From Flynn’s injury early in the year, Kelly Kane was still a little banged up and Marisa (DiLeo) put in so many minutes for us. I always worry, but how we started off, I guess it didn’t affect us too much.”

Both teams struggled offensively throughout the first three quarters, if you want to call it that. In fact, it was more of a strong defensive game for both teams than it was offensive issues.

“This is the best game we played as a team in a long time,” DiLeo said. “I’m proud of everyone. It was a huge game, huge power points, and we’re on top of the division right now. It’s awesome.”

Off and on throughout the night both teams employed the full-court press, with it working quite for each side in key situations.

After a 9-4 first quarter in favor of Cinnaminson, the Pirates trailed the Lancers 16-15 at the break thanks to Anne O’Malley and her buzzer-beating layup to cut the Holy Cross lead to just one point.

DiLeo led the Pirates with 10 points in the first half and 20 for the game. She had eight of the Pirates nine points in the first quarter. Tori Robinson finished with 10 points.

Remember her name because O’Malley would play a big role late in the fourth with the Pirates clinging to a short lead. Freshman Maddie Ogden got the start and made an impact on defense throughout the contest.

“She (Ogden) grew up a lot tonight,” Jenkins said. “You would never know she was a freshman playing in her first-ever Cinnaminson-Holy Cross basketball game. She played great, was all over, and had some really great rebounds towards the end.”

The third quarter saw a little bit of offense as Cinnaminson retook the lead at 25-21 heading into the fourth. Holy Cross had some buzzer-beating magic of its own at the end of the third as Mackenzie Moran hit a three to cut Cinnaminson’s lead to four.

The fourth quarter alone had a full game’s worth of excitement stuffed into eight minutes of play and reminded everyone of why the Cinnaminson-Holy Cross rivalry is so much fun.

Both teams put up 18 points, with the Pirates netting 13 of them from the foul line.

“I think a lot of it comes down to composure,” Jenkins said. “They came to the line so confident, like they wanted to shoot, and I think that played a big part in it.”

Cinnaminson shot 22-of-30 from the charity stripe for the game.

“In past games, the foul line hurt us,” DiLeo said. “We lost games because we missed our foul shots. It definitely helped us. We would not have been winning if we did not make our foul shots.”

Probably the most exciting sequence of plays in the fourth came on both defense and offense. O’Malley (we told you to remember her name) blocked a Lancers shot emphatically at one end to cause a turnover.

“We’re really learning what everyone wants to do and we just know our positions out there and it’s definitely helping on defense,” DiLeo said.

The Pirates went to advance the ball, but DiLeo was fouled. DiLeo hit both free throws to give the Pirates a 40-36 lead, but then Holy Cross’ long-range weapons struck.

The Lancers quickly advanced the ball across mid-court and connected on a three to cut the lead to 40-39. Those would be the final points scored by Holy Cross as the Pirates connected on three more foul shots to win 43-39.

“Our goal was to really get up on some of their players, the three-point shooters, and they executed it perfectly,” Jenkins said.

Cinnaminson will host Northern Burlington on Monday, January 25 at 6:15pm.

“Our bench is incredible,” Jenkins said. “For a coach nowadays, to get their intensity and how much they are into the game in today’s day and age is incredible and I’m lucky. We talked about it in the locker room and I think it played a major role into it tonight.”

Pirates Scoring:
Marisa DiLeo – 20
Tori Robinson – 10
Fiona Flynn – 5
Maddie Ogden – 5
Anne O’Malley – 3