After winning the top bracket at the Nike Tournament of Champions in Phoenix last week, No. 1 Archbishop Spalding's girls basketball players showed no letdown as they jumped back into conference play Wednesday night.
The Cavaliers held off a couple of rallies at No. 4 McDonogh and rolled through the last five minutes en route to a 63-45 victory in an Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference game.
There was never any danger of a post-holiday-tournament lapse, said senior All-Metro guard Maggie Morrison, who had 10 points and three assists, while Raven Makins led the Cavaliers with 18 points and Brya Freeland added 15.
"Wherever we go, it's going to be difficult," Morrison said. "Every team is going to want to get up for us. Every team's going to want to come out and win, so it doesn't really change from Arizona back to here. Our competition is some of the top competition around, so every game's going to be difficult."
The Eagles, playing their first ranked opponent his season, were trying to bounce back after falling at St.Frances in overtime Monday night, and they rallied from 18 points down to pull within 40-32 with 52 seconds left in the third quarter.
Taylor Cummings had a chance to cut the lead to six, but her layup wouldn't fall and the Cavaliers grabbed the rebound and the momentum. Freeland answered with a pull-up jumper to end the quarter. Makins opened the fourth quarter with her third 3-pointer and Shaquilla Curtis hit a free throw to run the lead to 46-32.
Candice Hendricks' layup and two Taryn Durrant free throws brought the Eagles within 10 with 5:52 to go, but the Cavaliers took off on a 10-point blitz, including 3-pointers from Sherae Swinson and Morrison to seal the victory.
"For us, that was a much better game than we played Monday night against St. Frances," McDonogh coach Brad Rees said. "We were under control and we did a decent job defensively on their big people. It's impossible [to stop them], because they have so many weapons. We thought we did a decent job on the big kids. They had 10 points the first half, but the guards were all knocking down threes."
The Cavaliers (13-2, 4-0 conference) hit seven three-pointers to just one for the Eagles (9-3, 2-2). That helped Spalding overcome 25 turnovers —16 in the first half.
"We turned the ball over a lot, but we definitely picked it up in the second half," Morrison said. "They're one of our biggest rivals, so both teams always get up for this game. It's always going to be good no matter what's going on."
AS—Freeland 15, Makins 18, Swinson 9, Curtis 6, Morrison 10, Calhoun 5. Totals 22 12-15 63.
M—Rees 2, Durant 10, Cummings 8, Ewing 2, Winder 9, Hendricks 4, Jacobs 10. Totals 16 12-13 45. Half: AS, 32-18.