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Mother Catherine takes SYBL boys
Team uses own basket as motivation
Friday, March 12, 2010
 Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photo by REID SILVERMAN
Mother Catherine's John Wood was named the tournament's most valuable player.
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With his Mother Catherine Spalding School team up 28-24 and 2 minutes 35 seconds remaining in regulation, Farrell scored a basket. Unfortunately for Farrell, it was in Archbishop Neale School's hoop.
Mother Catherine (16-2 overall) didn't get down. It used the unfortunate mistake as motivation and Farrell scored two baskets in the right hoop in the final 67 seconds to propel Mother Catherine to the title, 36-28.
"I was feeling a little bit ashamed for them, so I made a basket for them," Farrell said, jokingly.
Mother Catherine finished the game on an 8-2 run.
"We told Hunter to shake it off. He was a big part of this game," said John Wood, who led Mother Catherine with 15 points and received the tournament's most valuable player award.
It's the first title for head coach Jeff Gray in his 15 years of coaching.
"When Hunter made that two points in the wrong basket, the team rallied behind him," Gray said. "And everybody told him, ‘We got your back. We got your back.' And those boys did and Hunter came back through for us."
For Wood, this championship means a lot.
"It's my last game as an eighth-grader at Mother Catherine and I know all of us worked hard for it," he said.
It was the second loss of the entire season for Archbishop Neale, both coming against Mother Catherine.
"We're two evenly matched teams," Archbishop Neale coach Pat Thall said. His team finished 17-2. "I think what came down to it I think was we got a little bit tired at the end. We kind of lost our guys a couple times, gave up a few layups down the stretch. We just didn't get a few shots to fall."
Tyler Fields had 13 points for Archbishop Neale, which included three three-pointers. Fields received the coaches' hustle award.
"We actually got some shots to go down in the second half, but it just came down to a few bounces either way," Thall said. "I was very proud of them. They got nothing to be ashamed of, they should keep their heads up."
Thall mentioned that he would be stepping down at the end of the season as he has two daughters going to high school next year. In six years, he's been in the championship game five times, won it three times.
"I think they really wanted to try to win it for me," Thall said. "I tried to tell them it's about them, not about me. They're taking it hard for me, rather than for them, because they know they played their hearts out."
Farrell hit a layup with 1:07 to play to put Mother Catherine up 32-26. Two free throws from Chase Travers made it 32-28, but it would be the last points Archbishop Neale scored on the night.
Mother Catherine scored back-to-back baskets off inbounds passes, the last by Farrell, to complete the scoring and the title win.
"We wanted it more because it meant more to us," Farrell said.
It took just over 2 1/2 minutes for the first points of the contest, that being a three-pointer from Wood. Fields quickly answered with a three-pointer of his own, but Mother Catherine led 6-3 after one quarter.
Farrell's old-fashioned three-point play gave Mother Catherine an 11-5 lead with 4:09 left until halftime, but three-pointers from Fields and Austin Walker 31 seconds apart it at 11.
Archbishop Neale took its first lead of the night at 13-12 when Travers connected on a baseline jumper with 1:22 remaining and that would be the halftime score.
"MCS likes to slow it down," Thall said. "We tried to speed it up with the press, but obviously we could only get into the press when we score. We didn't score too often in that first quarter to get into the press as much as we would've wanted to."
Archbishop Neale went up by three in the opening minute of the second half on a short baseline jumper by Mac Burke, but two consecutive Wood three-pointers put Mother Catherine up 18-15 and it would not trail again.
Archbishop Neale got as close as 20-19 on a Walker putback with 1:36 to play, but Nic Gagnon answered with a long jumper at the other end and Mother Catherine took a 22-19 lead into the fourth.
Two Burke free throws made it 22-21 just 44 seconds into the final quarter. Mother Catherine answered with the next six points, the last being a Farrell putback on his team's third offensive rebound with 3:05 left.
Fields drained his third three-pointer of the game moments later, starting a 5-0 run that ended with Farrell's basket into Archbishop Neale's hoop.
"They knew what they had to do and they did it today," Gray said. "I love these guys and they're a great group of kids."
Mother Catherine 36, Archbishop Neale 28
Mother Catherine 6 6 10 14
Archbishop Neale 3 10 6 9
Mother Catherine: Wood 15, Farrell 11, Ripple 4, Gagnon 3,
Buckler 2, Fitzgerald 1
Archbishop Neale: Fields 13, Walker 5, Burke 4, Travers 4, Team 2
Free throws: Mother Catherine 3-9 (Farrell 1-1); Archbishop Neale 4-4 (Burke 2-2, Travers 2-2)
3-point goals: Mother Catherine 3 (Wood 3); Archbishop Neale 3
(Fields 3)
