Whenever Archbishop Spalding and Seton Keough meet, you're going to see a lot more defense than offense.
Sunday afternoon, the No. 1 Cavaliers used strong inside defense against No. 2 Seton Keough's superior height to come away with a 49-36 victory, their second this season over the host Gators in the Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference.
Spalding forwards Shaquilla Curtis, Sherae Swinson and Camille Calhoun — none taller than 6 feet — countered 6-foot-4 Liz Brown and strong 6-foot-1 Achiri Ade, holding them to 21 combined points. That wasn't nearly enough to overwhelm the Cavaliers, who now have a two-game lead in the conference two weeks before the IAAM tournament starts.
The trio used good position and athleticism to get in the way of most shots in the paint — one of the reasons the host Gators missed 14 layups.
"Their play was huge," Spalding senior guard Maggie Morrison said of her teammates. "Most of the Keough play comes from inside with Achiri and Liz. We're undersized obviously. Whoever we play, the fact that they play so tough and keep battling inside — the heart that they have is unreal."
Swinson, 6 feet; Curtis, 5 feet 8, and Calhoun, 5 feet 10, had never won a game in Seton Keough's gym, but Sunday they combined for 29 rebounds and 18 points. They weren't as worried about their offense as they were about the defense and rebounding.
"You don't have to put a lot of pressure on yourself [to score], because other people on your team can do the same thing as you," the 5-foot-8 Curtis said. "I don't have to shoot that much … and I pay more attention where my main thing is — getting rebounds."
The Cavaliers (18-2, 8-0 IAAM) led the entire game, unlike the first meeting in December when they took a 19-point lead only to let it slip away before rallying to win 63-58 in double overtime.
The Gators (15-5, 8-2) couldn't manage a basket for the first five minutes and the Cavaliers led 7-1 by then. A mini-spurt to end the first quarter made it 13-5 when Morrison fed Raven Makins for a layup. Aleah Epps' 15-footer gave the Cavaliers their biggest lead at 31-19 two minutes into the second half.
Seton Keough pulled within seven three times in the final 10 minutes, lastly on Amber Singletary's layup with 2:24 to go. Brya Freeland answered by banking in an 18-footer and the Gators did not score again.
"We just couldn't get that big shot to really get our momentum going," Gators coach Jackie Boswell said. "I think every layup that we missed just kind of brought us down a little bit more. I thought we played hard, but [with] missed layup after missed layup, we just got a little disheartened and that's kind of hard to come back from."
AS—Freeland 10, Makins 5, Swinson 9, Morrison 8, Chestnut 2, Curtis 7, Epps 4, Griffith 2, Calhoun 2. Totals 20 5-8 49.
SK—Wilson 6, Singletary 8, Hines 1, Ade 14, Brown 7. Totals 12 12-20 36. Half: AS, 27-19