Lady Hornets extract well-earned win at Mount St. Mary
EDITOR’S NOTE: Because the look back at each day in Bryant athletic history has been so favorably received during the time when there was no sports during the COVID-19 shutdown, BryantDaily.com will continueposting past stories of Bryant athletics either posted on BryantDaily.com (from 2009 to the present) or published in the Bryant Times (from 1998 to 2008).
Photos by Kevin Nagle
LITTLE ROCK — If you’ve never been to a basketball game at the McCauley Center at Mount St. Mary Academy, you may not quite understand. It’s an old chapel with brick walls, padded under both goals but not along the sideline opposite the benches where the wall seems to be looming all too close.
But that’s not the main thing. The acoustics in the gym are, shall we say, unique. No matter what size the crowd or how many cheerleaders and pep squad members are on hand, the gym kind of sucks up all the sound and turns it into white noise. It always seems to be loud but nothing can be discerned of anything any one individual is saying.
It makes for an added challenge to visiting coaches, making McCauley Gym one of the toughest places to visiting teams to win.
And it was especially so on Friday night when the Bryant Lady Hornets visited because[more] of the emotional return to the gym of Mary Drake, who would be a senior for the Belles but for a severe head-on auto collision in November of 2009. Drake has had to overcome paralysis and a coma. Her recovery and rehab are ongoing.
But the Bryant Lady Hornets got it done, leading pretty much wire-to-wire. The 53-38 win was the 7A-Central Conference opener for both teams.
“We played pretty well, especially being there, a tough place to go and play,” said Lady Hornets coach Blake Condley. “We had some chances to buckle some.”
Bryant led 13-8 after a quarter and 27-19 at the half as senior Abbi Stearns scored all 9 of her points taking it to the Belles’ interior defense.
“Abbi attacked the basket,” Condley noted. “She did a really good job early of attacking. She got to the free throw line and hit a couple, made some baskets but then she picked up her second foul. She played for a little while then I subbed her out. I put her right back in towards the end of the half and we let them get two or three offensive rebounds and, on the third one, Abbi picked up her third foul before halftime. She didn’t foul out though. She only fouled once in the second half so she did a really good job defensively and on the boards.”
The lead was 38-25 at the end of the third quarter then the Belles made a run to cut the lead to 6.
“We hit a dry spell where we didn’t score for a little bit,” Condley explained. “They were in a zone so we just backed it out, brought it out to half court and made us come guard us man.”
Bryant worked the ball for about a minute then sophomore McKenzie Adams drove to the basket and was fouled. She made both free throws to make it an 8-point game.
As Bryant assistant coach related, the spread offense is supposed to be run with no shooting except for free throws and layups. But, with the Lady Hornets up by 8, sophomore Kiara Moore got free in the left corner and launched a 3-pointer from a tough spot.
It was one of those proverbial situations that have a coach saying, ‘No, no, no . . . yes!” The shot went down and put the Lady Hornets back up by double digits.
Parish recalled that she and Condley exchanged looks that had the assistant struggling to hide laughter.
As it turned out, Parish related, Moore explained when everyone got on the bus to head back to Bryant that she thought she heard Condley yelling, “Pop it!”
So she did.
“That’s just not something he says,” Parish mentioned.
It left Condley wondering what he said that even sounded like that.
McCauley Gym strikes again.
Nonetheless, the Lady Hornets were back on track and by converting 10 of 12 free throws in the final quarter, secured the victory. Adams contributed a driving layup as she was fouled then two more free throws after Moore’s trey.
She finished with 22 points and four steals. Moore had 12 points and two thefts as the Lady Hornets forced 14 turnovers. Stearns and Breanna Blundell each collected seven rebounds.
For the game, the Lady Hornets converted 20 of 29 from the line.
“It’s great to win our conference opener,” Condley concluded, “especially going to Mount. They played really hard with Mary Drake there. There wasn’t a dry eye on their team before the game. That had a lot to do with them playing so hard. It was a pretty emotional night for them.”
The Lady Hornets improved to 14-0 on the season going into Tuesday’s home conference game against Van Buren. Mount St. Mary fell to 3-8 with a trip to Cabot set for Tuesday.
