Ocean City beats Mainland in a defensive battle, 32-29, to reclaim title they lost to MRHS last year
The Ocean City High School girls basketball team poses with the South Jersey Group III sectional trophy March 10 after beating Mainland Regional High School, the defending South Jersey and state champions, 32-29 at Mainland.
LINWOOD – The Ocean City girls basketball team reclaimed the South Jersey crown from rival Mainland Regional March 10, but it was not an offensive showcase for either team.
The cross-bay teams that have faced each other in each of the last four South Jersey title games went at each other like wary heavyweight champion boxers, tentatively sizing each other up in the ring because they have seen the other’s moves time and again and knew the knockout blows they could inflict upon each other.
That led to an exceptionally slow start that saw Mainland control the early going by doubling Ocean City’s points, yet only leading 16-8 at the end of the first half.
After two regular season games this winter during which they combined for 100 and 110 points, respectively, Ocean City and Mainland were knotted at 20-20 at the end of the third quarter.
The Mustangs slowly crept ahead, 26-20, with four minutes left in the game, but that’s when the Red Raiders finally put it all together. In that last stretch, Ocean City came back with a dozen points while limiting Mainland to a single 3-pointer by Lila Schoen, who led her team with 11 points, including triple threes.
With seconds left, Mainland had two chances to tie, but both long-distance shots were hurried and fell short.
The Red Raiders celebrated as time ran out, winning the 2020 NJSIAA South Jersey Group III crown with a 32-29 final score. It was their fourth sectional title in the past five years.
Coach Paul Baruffi admitted he is hard on his players in games and during practice, but he said the toughness they learn is what allowed them to come through at the end of the game.
“If you would have told me at the beginning of the year that we’d be standing here, I don’t know what I would have told you. We work hard and the hard work paid off,” Baruffi said. “I’m tough on them and I tell them all the time it’s because this is what you get at the end if you work hard. If you want to get something like a South Jersey championship, it doesn’t happen if you’re not tough and you don’t work hard.
Sometimes, I know, people don’t understand that, but that’s what it takes. That’s how you have to be.”
Baruffi also pointed to the early season schedule that saw the Red Raiders lose five of their first six games of the season to top, out-of-conference opponents.
“Early in the year when we were 1-5, we played really good teams that pressured us and that prepared us for tonight,” he said. “I talked about that from the beginning. I knew that that schedule at the beginning would be murderous, but we took it. You could see it in the last game and you could see it tonight, that in the pressure situations we didn’t fold. We didn’t fold. I had a freshman (Avery Jackson) out there that didn’t fold. They all did what they had to do and I’m super proud of them.”
He said the analogy to heavyweight fighters in yet another rematch was apt.
“They know where we’re going and we pretty much know where they’re going,” Baruffi said of the Mustangs. “It’s just a matter of who gets lucky at the right time, I think. We finally got it to go our way.”
He said over the course of the season there have been times when the team goes cold shooting. That happened in the first two quarters Tuesday, but although they bent, they did not break under the early pressure and waited until their shots started to fall.
“We knew we just had to knock a couple down. We knew we had to turn the pressure up to try to create some things for us and it happened,” he said.
As for reclaiming the title, Baruffi smiled. “It’s unbelievable.”
Slow start, but dramatic finish
Mainland senior Madi Hafetz opened the scoring more than a minute into the game when she hit a 3-pointer. Shortly after, she fed the ball inside to Kaitlyn Boggs, who put it in from under the basket for a 5-0 lead.
Red Raider senior Abbey Fenton, who led all players in the game with 15 points – nearly half of her team’s total – responded with a 3-pointer of her own. Though limited to a single foul shot in the second quarter, Fenton’s 8 points in the third quarter would lead her team back into the game.
With five minutes to go in the quarter, Marin Panico hit for 2 to tie the game at 5-5. The Red Raiders would not hit another field goal the rest of the half.
Mustang Cadence Fitzgerald hit a field goal to break the tie and then Schoen hit the first of her 3-pointers. Coupled with free throws by Boggs and Fitzgerald, Mainland ended the quarter with a 12-5 lead.
Not only did Ocean City put up only 3 points in the second quarter, on two free throws by senior Delaney Lappin and one by Fenton, Mainland managed just 4 points as the Mustangs went into their own scoring slump.
Schoen got one breakaway layup in the quarter and senior Kylee Watson, the McDonald’s All-American headed to play basketball at Division I Oregon in the fall, added the only other 2 points, both by free throws.
Watson, who topped 2,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in her career, ended up with only 3 points in her final game as a Mustang, much of that due to being double- and tripled-teamed and having her drives to the basket blocked as the Red Raiders packed the lane.
As Baruffi walked off the court at the end of the half, which finished with Mainland up 16-8, he said to himself, “We can’t shoot to save our lives.” It was a problem that would start to be rectified in the second half as Mainland’s shooting woes persisted.
As the third quarter began, Mainland spent more than a minute trying to find a clean shot, then missed it. Ocean City got the ball back, but couldn’t convert. The teams then traded steals.
Three minutes in, courtesy of another Watson block, there still wasn’t a score until a backdoor pass allowed Fenton to sneak in a shot from beneath the basket.
More time wasted away with balls thrown away on bad passes, combined with steals on other sloppy passes by both teams.
Fenton hit a 3-pointer to make it a one-point game, 16-15, and then Emma Finnegan scored to give the Red Raiders their first lead of the game, 17-16, with just over a minute left.
Schoen responded with a 3-pointer, to put Mainland back up, and Fenton quickly matched her.
One free throw later by Watson and the teams finished the third quarter tied at 20-20.
In the final stanza, Mainland showed its last burst of offensive energy. Boggs scored, then hit the front end of a one-and-one, but Mainland got the rebound and fed it to Schoen for a 3-pointer and a 26-20 lead.
That’s when Ocean City started getting a little help from everywhere in the lineup, even though the game would be a tossup until the final seconds.
As the Red Raiders went the other way, Watson stuffed Finnegan on a shot, but the senior center for Ocean City battled hard for a big rebound and fed it to junior Marlee Brestle, who hit for a long 2.
With three minutes to go, Fenton hit her last 3-pointer to bring Ocean City within a point, 26-25. Mainland missed a chance, then senior Lauren Mirsky, playing on an injured knee, scored her first basket of the game from the baseline to put Ocean City on top, 27-26.
The Mustangs threw the ball away on their next possession and Ocean City started playing keep-away, running down the clock to 1:09.
The Red Raiders got their opportunity, feeding it to an open Avery Jackson, the freshman, to make it 29-26. Ocean City got the ball back and Mainland fouled, bringing Lappin to the line, where she missed the front end of a one-and-one. Watson rebounded, took the ball down the court then threw up a hasty 3-pointer that missed the basket, prompting her to put her face in her hands at the missed opportunity.
Mainland quickly fouled again, putting Lappin back at the line where she scored, making it 31-26. Watson again brought it down the court, this time feeding Hafetz, who hit from 3-point range and closed the gap to 31-29.
Forced to foul again, Brestle went to the line and hit the front end, making it 32-29. The Mustangs raced the ball down the court and gave it to Hafetz, who threw up an off-balance shot that missed.
With a handful of seconds on the clock, time ran out for the Mustangs, who finished the season 21-7. Ocean City, at 22-8, will play Central Jersey sectional champion Westampton Tech at 5 p.m. Thursday at Deptford High School. The winner goes on to the state final Sunday at RWJ Barnabas Arena in Toms River.
Westhampton Tech, the No. 2 seed in Central Jersey, beat No. 4 Neptune, 61-53. In the other state semifinal, it’s Ramapo versus Warren Hills.
Score by quarters
Mainland 12-4-4-9=29
Ocean City 5-3-12-12=32
