Game starts out ugly but builds to its usual crescendo down the stretch
By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
OCEAN CITY – The first quarter of last week’s season-opening basketball game between fierce rivals Ocean City and Mainland was ugly. It took nearly four and a half minutes before anything registered on the scoreboard as the girls shook off the rust from little time to practice and no preseason scrimmages.
After that it boiled down to the game fans are familiar with when the Red Raiders, last year’s state semifinalists, meet up with the Mustangs, the prior year’s state champions. (There was no state championship game last year because of the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.)
The two teams matched up evenly with the game up in the air until the final seconds in an eerily quiet gym at Ocean City High School with no fans in the stands, save for a half-dozen junior varsity players and a lone newspaper reporter.
Once things got going, the quarters ended with a 4-2 Mainland lead after the first, an 18-17 Ocean City lead at the half, a 29-26 Mainland lead after the third and a final score of 39-35 in the Mustangs’ favor with a foul shot that sealed the deal with 1.9 seconds left.
Ocean City did have the ball with a chance to tie from 3-point range with 14 seconds left, but a harassing Mustang defense didn’t allow for a clean shot with Mainland leading 38-35. The late throw under pressure missed the mark, Mainland got the rebound and took the foul.
Ocean City actually hit more 3-point shots than regular baskets, registering 7 of them during the game, three courtesy of Avery Jackson and two each courtesy of freshmen Hannah Cappelletti and Ayana Morton. Jackson led all scorers with 13 points with Marin Panico adding 9 and Morton and Cappelletti 7 and 6, respectively.
The Mustangs were glad to see the return of junior Camryn Dirkes, who spent last basketball season wheeling around the sidelines on a scooter recovering from a knee injury. She led Mainland with 12 points – a pair of threes, two baskets and two free throws, including the one at the end. Senior Lila Schoen had 9 points, including one three, junior Cadence Fitzgerald added 7, junior Kaitlyn Boggs had 5 and freshman Kasey Bretones had a pair of threes for 6 points.
Mustang coach Scott Betson has some returning varsity players leading his team, but he also ran four freshmen on the court.
“This is only our seventh day of playing basketball right now. We started a week ago so no scrimmages, a late start,” Betson said. “We have a lot of things to clean up. It was a great test to play against a good team that clearly knows what they’re doing.”
Dirkes and Schoen are the players with the most minutes returning and Boggs, he said, “came on really strong at the end of last year. We felt really good about them even though Cam didn’t play at all last year. We feel good about all those returning starters.”
He still wanted see what his younger players could do so he gave a bunch of them court time.
“Kasey (Bretones) played some big minutes tonight so I was super proud of her,” he said.
Betson said he is glad there is a basketball season, but it isn’t like usual.
“There was a substantial portion of the year where I thought we weren’t going to have any chance to play at all, so any time we can get out on the court I’m just grateful for whatever the circumstances are,” he said. “I don’t think anything feels normal. They’re spaced out on the bench and wearing masks. High school sports is where most kids have their best memories so being able to get them out on the court we’re all really happy about it.”
With no championship tournaments planned, Betson said “our most important goal is just to take care of ourselves and make good decisions in everything we do so we can just keep playing basketball. The goal, I said to somebody the other day, is that success is going to be measured more than by wins and losses, just being able to get to the floor itself.
“Our goal is everything we do, every decision we make, we just want to keep making good decisions so we can keep playing basketball,” Betson said.
Ocean City coach Paul Baruffi also has simply playing basketball as a priority.
“First off I want them to try to get through the whole season because you can get shut down at any time. We’re trying to be as careful as possible, as smart as possible. I’ve never sanitized so much in my life,” he said. The other goal “is to improve and compete.”
Baruffi expects with the teams his Red Raiders will face there are going to be battles every night. It could go either way. So there is something that you’re playing for there. But we’re going to have to work really hard to pull wins out against those teams” including Mainland, Wildwood Catholic, Atlantic City and Middle Township.
He thought his team’s play against Mainland could have been smoother, especially on defense.
“I think we gave up baseline way too many times tonight. I’ve never had a team give up baseline like that before. That tells me that is something we have to drill,” he said, along with not getting beat off the dribble and being in position to help.
He chalked part of that up to the short practice time before the season started and that he and the other coaches focused more on offense than defense “so I can take a little blame for that for not going over it as much. That’s our job, to correct the mistakes they made and hopefully have a different outcome.”
He plans to balance giving his seniors playing time while developing his younger players this season. “I thought a lot of the younger girls showed something tonight,” he noted, singling out Morton for her play. Baruffi said Panico and Brestle are the team’s most experienced players and Jackson also had a significant amount of playing time last season.
Although it was unusual playing in a gym with empty stands, he said he experienced that in the state semifinals last year before the season was abruptly ended by the pandemic. However, he said once a game is going, the focus just turns to what is on the court.
Ocean City 54
LCMR 29
Ocean City evened its record at 1-1 with a 54-29 victory at Lower Cape May Regional High School Thursday evening.
Avery Jackson led all players with 15 points, including a pair of threes. Hannah Cappelletti had 8 points; Marin Panico, Ayana Morton and Marlee Brestle each scored 7; Stephanie Carey had 6 and Taylor Wenner and Tori Vliet had 2 each.
Lindsay Holden led LCMR with 12, Kaitlyn McGuigan had 11, Hailey Anzelone had 4 and Molly McGuigan contributed 2.
LCMR is 0-2 on the season.
Ocean City hosts Middle Township at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday and is at Wildwood Catholic at 6 p.m. Friday.
Mainland 64
Cape May Tech 30
Mainland improved to 2-0 with a 64-30 victory over Cape May Tech (0-2) Thursday evening. The Mustangs dominated the first two quarters 25-9 and 26-7 then eased up in the second half after the big lead.
Ava Mazur led the Mustangs with 12 points, Camryn Dirkes had 10 and Lila Schoen had 11. Bella Mazur, Kasey Bretones and Kaitlyn Boggs had 6 each; Kareema Rex had 5, Sydney Stokes and Cadence Fitzgerald had 4 each; and Alyssa Turner and McKenna Pontari had 2 each.
The girls host Lower Cape May Regional at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday and are at Middle Township at 6 p.m. Friday.
