The Cardinal O’Hara Lady Hawks have been in some tight contests this season, but this one did not fall into that category, as a dominant defensive performance gave them a 72-29 win over Mount St. Mary’s.
O’Hara came out of the gates hot, with the entire team hitting their shots, as they led 21-0 with about two minutes to go in the first quarter. But it was the Lady Hawk’s extremely strong and aggressive defense that was helping them continually extend their lead. Their full court press on Mount’s smaller court was a force to be reckoned with, as it seemed every time the Thunder touched the ball, seconds later it was stolen. It wasn’t until there was 1:50 left in the first when Mount finally got on the board, and the quarter ended in a dominant 23-3 lead for O’Hara.
The second quarter wasn’t much different, as continued pressure from the Lady Hawks forced more Mount turnovers. O’Hara’s strong bench also chipped in, as 10 of their 11 players reached the score sheet. The team’s depth has been a great asset throughout the season and should continue to be as the year goes on. A 22 point quarter for the Lady Hawks brought the halftime score to 45-11.
The second half brought some improvements for the Thunder, as a full court press later in the game brought about a couple turnovers and the offense began to put up a few points, but the hole they were in was just too deep to climb out of.
The Lady Hawks were led by Cierra Harrison who put up 14 in the team effort win. Angel Parker and Nickelle O’Neil closely followed with 10 points each.
Despite the score coming off as a bit of a whitewash and the Lady Hawks putting up a strong 72 points, senior Cori Dickson feels that the offense possesses even more that it can bring to the table.
“We hustled hard, but we didn’t execute our offense to its full potential,” said Dickson. “Our defense is what got us the W.”
O’Hara head coach Darryl O’Neil agreed, and also had some praise for the Thunder.
“It was a great win, Mount St. Mary’s does a great job on defense,” said O’Neil. “They took away a lot of things we wanted to do offensively. The score doesn’t indicate the whole story, they played pretty well on defense.”
As for Mount, Madison Badgley and Grace O’Brien both put up 6 points to lead the stat sheet in the loss.
“We didn’t come out ready to play, it was one of those nights,” said Thunder head coach Mike McCarthy. “O’Hara hasn’t lost a game locally in about four years, and I think that caused some nerves to come out before the game even started.”
The big win puts Cardinal O’Hara at 7-2 on the year and the loss drops Mount to 4-3. Each team is back in action on January 9th, as the Thunder take on Nichols at 6:30 and the Lady Hawks play their first home game of the season against St. Mary’s Lancaster at 6:00.
