According to St. Vincent girls basketball coach Mel Kirn, the game was “ugly” and his team could have played much better.
However, he will take the result.
St. Vincent hung on to beat Herculaneum 49-38 on Monday as the Indians rebounded from a tough loss to St. Pius a few days earlier.
“It was a sloppy game and we have to win those types of games,” Kirn said. “We led the entire game and hung on late, which is the sign of a good team.”
Despite leading for the entire contest, the Blackcats hung around, partly because each team committed 24 turnovers apiece, and Herculaneum made just enough shots to keep close.
Haley Smith made a three-pointer with 2:40 left to narrow the St. Vincent led to 38-36.
From that moment on, the Indians showed some grit. They ended the game on an 11-2 run, with six of the last eight points being scored by freshmen. Rylee Robinson made two layups along the baseline and Regan Meyer hit a pair of free throws after Robinson fouled out late in the game.
“There were some freshmen girls who went into the late game that didn’t think they were going to go in during the last two minutes,” Kirn said. “Rylee hit two big shots late and Regan came in off the bench cold.”
Allie Patrick led the Indians with 13 points, while Haley Emmendorfer had 10. Lana Adams chipped in seven points and Cailyn Prost added six. Smith led all scorers with 15 points for the Blackcats.
Herculaneum deployed a full court press that caused St. Vincent all sorts of problems throughout the contest. Kirn said that his team relied too much of dribbling to break through the Blackcat pressure.
“We kept dribbling too much. I thought we passed it better in the second half and were able to move the ball,” Kirn said. “When we passed Herculaneum couldn’t keep up with it and stay in front of us. When we started looking for the open person, we started to click a little better.”
It certainly didn’t look like the game would be as close as it was as the Indians jumped out to a 11-0 lead and led 13-2 after the first quarter, thanks to a trio of three-pointers from Patrick.
However, the Indians could not sustain the offense as they did not make a shot until the 3:30 mark of the second quarter when Emmendorfer hit a triple to give St. Vincent a 20-10 lead.
The Blackcats chipped away and cut the St. Vincent lead to 25-17 at half.
“I thought we panicked at times,” Kirn said. “I would rather take a backcourt violation then throw it over our heads and give it to them right away. We weren’t doing our back cuts or moving without the ball to find the open spots.”
Herculaneum fell behind by 10, but made several threes including one by Jillian Jarvis that cut the Indian lead to 29-27 with one minute to go in the third quarter.
Despite the win, St. Vincent did suffer a loss as Emmendorfer left the game with two seconds to go in the quarter with a leg injury.
She did not return to the game in the fourth quarter.
“She got landed on pretty hard and I’m hoping it’s just a bruise,” Kirn said. “We have about two-and-a-half weeks that she has to recover and be healthy for districts.”
Overall, Kirn was proud of his team’s effort.
“Our girls don’t quit,” he said. “They work hard, but things didn’t click tonight, but we found something late that helped us come away with the win.”
