LINWOOD — No matter how well the Mustang girls do this week in the Cape-Atlantic League basketball tournament, the priority remains on the state tournament that follows.
Mainland Regional ran over No. 16 Millville (5-16) 63-34 Thursday evening and then defeated No. 9 Our Lady of Mercy Academy (13-10) 42-25 on Saturday.
On Wednesday, the top-seeded Mustangs will take on No. 5 Wildwood Catholic in the CAL semifinals as No. 2 Atlantic City battles No. 3 Middle Township in the other semifinal.
The finals are Saturday at Egg Harbor Township High School.
The Mainland girls and boys teams are the defending champions.
“This tournament is great and it’s really fun if we win it, but it’s kind of where you learn tournament play to get ready for the big one that’s coming up after it,” Mustang coach Scott Betson said. “We hope to compete. Obviously it would be great to win it again, but the real focus is getting ready for the Group III tournament.”
The coach said the CAL is loaded this season.
“There is more depth than there has been. I don’t know if there is a clear-cut powerhouse like there has been in certain years that everyone has been chasing and trying to catch,” he said. “I think you’re going to see, especially in the next round, a number of teams who can beat anybody out there.”
Playing good teams is important for the Mustangs.
“You want to schedule a tough season so you are prepared for the tough ones down the stretch,” Betson said. “The thing about this league is we’ve been playing all the tough teams we’re going to be playing here in this tournament the way things have shook out in the conferences, other than Atlantic City, who has come on really strong.”
Beating CAL competition, however, doesn’t mean much to the team or coach when they see those teams again. And being the defending champion doesn’t factor into this year’s tournament either.
“We talked to the kids that each game stands alone so one season has absolutely nothing to do with the next season, especially at this point of the year. We’re likely to see some rematches of teams we have played a couple of times. You don’t get to carry over the scores from the game before. The games all start at 0-0. We don’t believe in any of that. We just go out and focus on the game that is in front,” he said.
“I feel like we put ourselves in the best position that we could with our body of work over the course of the regular season, but like I just said, one game has nothing to do with the next,” he said. “We hope to put good products out there when we need it on game nights when the (Group III) tournament starts.”
CAL tournament
The Mustangs (21-2) were led against the Thunderbolts by Ava Mazur (14 points), Kasey Bretones (11) and Bella Mazur (10). Adding points in the Millville game were Sydney Stokes and Alexa Levy with 6 each, Emily Paytas 4, Gia Geraci had 3, and Jane Meade, Maddie Meade and Ava Sheeran with 2 each.
Building a huge lead early let Betson put in a lot of his roster.
Bella Mazur had 15 points and twin sister Ava contributed 11 in the win over OLMA. Stokes added 7, Jane Meade 4, Bretones 3 and Sheeran 2.
By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
