Trinity pulls away from St. Catherine's to avenge January loss

They’d been there before.

Slim halftime lead. High hopes. Abiding confidence. Strong second half. Victory within their grasp.

Then…

Monday night, though, when the Trinity Epicopal Titans took the court for the third quarter against St. Catherine’s at the Saints’ Kenny Center, they vowed that they wouldn’t relinquish their 24-22 advantage as they had 17 days earlier when their longtime League of Independent Schools rival rallied from a 30-25 deficit at the break to win a 56-54 nail-biter.

Instead, they would remain focused for 16 more minutes, maintain their already over-the-top defensive intensity, convert turnovers into points, and, once the final horn sounded, head back across the river with victory in hand.

Mission accomplished.

On the strength of an A-plus defensive effort that forced 11-for-30 shooting and 35 turnovers, many of which led directly to chip-shot offensive opportunities, Coach Adam Lonon’s crew rode a 41-14 second half to a 65-36 triumph.

“We lost to them before, and we didn’t want to do that again,” said Frances Fischi, a 5-8 senior guard whose defensive acumen and heads-up play led to 28 points.

“At half, Coach said, ‘All right, guys, we’re not doing this again. We have to be stronger and smarter.’ Then, the captains (Fischi, Sutton Eldredge, and Caroline Ashoff) got the team rolling.

“We had some really good takes, which got us rolling. Everyone was working together really well.”

At 7:12 of the third quarter, Saints point guard Savannah Spaulding hit an 8-foot floater from the left side to tie the game at 24, but the Titans went on a 17-6 run and took a 41-30 lead into the fourth.

“In the first half, our shots weren’t falling,” said Eldredge, a 5-11 junior who finished with 21 points. “It was important for us to keep our heads and remain a unit. 

“That started defensively. Maintaining high energy is a big emphasis for us, especially after our last game with them didn’t go at all how we wanted it to go.”

The Titans (8-5) opened the final quarter with a 10-0 run to thwart any hope of a St. Catherine’s comeback.

At 6:52, Morgan Trimble banked in a transition layup, drew a foul, and converted the and-one. At 6:15, Eldredge scored from close range off an offensive rebound, then drained an NBA length 3-pointer at 5:52.

On the Saints’ next possession, Fischi converted a well-timed steal into a layup to give the Titans a 51-30 lead at 5:20.

“Our defense really led to our offense,” Fischi said. “That was what sparked us. Just getting your hands in passing lanes. We knew where the ball was going to go, so we could get easy layups off of fast breaks.”

Ryan Lewis (12 points) hit a free throw at 5:15 to end the Saints’ scoring drought. Then, the Titans ended with a 14-5 run to put an exclamation mark on their victory.

“For any basketball player, you take a couple of weeks off when you’re not going through the routine of practice or going through your playbook, you can definitely struggle,” said Lonon, whose team hadn’t convened but twice since its last game January 21 because of the winter weather hiatus. 

“As the game got going, our defense turned into offense, some of our plays started working at that point as well, and we were able to hit some shots.”

The Saints (9-5), idle since January 23, played mostly zone (1-2-2), then switched to man-to-man as Trinity began to pull away.

The Titans played a box-and-one much of the night with Ashoff (spelled at times by Mary Mac Starke) checking Spaulding, who finished with 11 points.

They also showed a variety of looks out of their full-court press.

Their strategy worked as intended by preventing the Saints from getting into their offensive rhythm.

“We were really trying to limit the ball-handling situation,” Lonon said. “Luckily, it worked out.”

The Titans shot 23-for-54 (including 15-for-26 in the second half) from the field and surrendered just seven turnovers. The Saints outrebounded them 33-21.

“If we came in slow, we knew we’d have a really hard time,” Fischi said. “We knew we had to scrap, because that’s all we could really do. 

“Our effort was a lot better in every area of the game than when we played them last time. It was really all about effort.”