Seniors lead Mount's success

EMMITSBURG - The Mount St. Mary's women's basketball team is relying heavily on its seniors during what's shaping up to be its best season in more than a decade. Five of the Mount's top six scorers are seniors and the rest of the Mountaineers are generally deferential, particularly to stalwarts Sydney Henderson and Jaqueline Brewer.

Junior Jenn Carney usually defers to her higher-scoring teammates, at least during games. In practice, however, Carney often plays the role of the best player on her team's upcoming opponent and, by all accounts, she does a pretty fair imitation.

The "scout team" superstar played the role of her own team's best player Monday, tripling her career high with 30 points to help the Mountaineers stay hot with a 69-55 win over Central Connecticut that was coach Bryan Whitten's 300th career victory.

The Mountaineers improved to 11-11 overall and 6-4 in the Northeast Conference. It's their best 10-game conference mark in Whitten's seven seasons at the Mount and it has them tied for fourth. With eight games remaining before the NEC tournament, the Mountaineers are aiming for their first overall winning record since 2000-01 and are shooting for a top-four finish, which would give them their first home game in the NEC tourney since 2002.

"We definitely have worked very hard for this season," said Henderson, who leads the team with 17.8 points per game and picked up her 250th career assist on Monday. "We knew that this year the bar was going to be raised higher. We just know from 1-through-14 everyone can play great on a given night."

Monday was Carney's given night.

Averaging just 2.9 points per game with a grand total of 26 points in nine NEC contests, she went 8 for 11 from the floor including a perfect 4 for 4 from 3-point range and she also went 10 for 10 from the foul line.

"When we do scout, we always make her the other team's best guard and we run the other team's sets, and she just goes off," Whitten said. "But when she's Jen, she's hesitant. ... She defers a lot to the senior class."

Henderson has seen that, too. But not Monday.

"She played with confidence tonight. She just let it fly," Henderson said. "Every day in practice we just tell her to be confident with the ball in her hands, and that's what she did tonight."

Carney had reached double-digits in college just once, scoring 10 points at Wagner last year. She said she isn't even sure she ever had a game like Monday's in high school, and she credited her teammates.

"Basically, they were just finding me wide open - I'm going to shoot if I'm open," said Carney,who enjoys her scout team role. "I think it gives me confidence being the best player on the other team."

Whitten liked the fact that the team won Monday without Henderson having to score much. The fifth-year senior, who has scored 20 points or more 10 times this season, had only six points against Central, although she also contributed seven rebounds, five assists and three steals. Second-leading scorer Brewer had only seven points. But senior Kayla Grossett had 10 points and nine rebounds.

Defense was also a major key Monday as the Mountaineers forced 19 turnovers and limited Central to 33.3 percent from the field, including a dreadful 1 for 15 on 3-pointers. The Mountaineers have won three of four and five of seven as they set off for a four-game road trip.

Whitten coached his 200th game at the Mount on Monday. He picked up his 80th win which, added to the 220 he had during a wildly successful run at Division III King's College, gives him 300 total.

"It just says I've had some great players and I've coached for 19 years," he said. "When I was 25, we started 0-13. I never thought I'd see one [win], let alone 300."

Whitten said he isn't adding lines to his resume, however.

"I don't want another job," he said. "I want to build something special."

He has had to build it from scratch.

After being the top team in the NEC throughout the 1990s, the Mountaineers began to erode at around the turn of the milennium. When they won an NEC quarterfinal game a year ago, it was their first conference tournament win since 2001.

After averaging just 10 wins per season over his first four at the Mount, Whitten's team went 14-16 in 2012-13 and 15-16 last year. It was all building toward this season, with Henderson, Brewer Ashley Christie, Jessie Kaufman, and Rachel Mathews all entering their senior seasons.

"The goal this year was, with the seniors, with the experience ... let's finish in the fop four, get a home game, see what happens from there," Whitten said.

Henderson said she and the other seniors are all playing with more urgency than ever, and that Whitten is treating them a bit differently.

"I think he's a little more hard on us - and that's what we need," she said. "He has more confidence in us this year because he just knows the level we can play at and the potential we have to be great."