Most anticipated matchup: No. 2 Pearl River vs No. 3 Albertus Magnus in Class A—The friendly rivals split their regular season series. They bring out the best in each other.
Closest game: No. 5 Ursuline vs No. 8 Mount Vernon in Class AA—Another regular season split. Ursuline has thus far been able to counter a big size disadvantage.
Game that could get most out of hand: No. 3 Keio vs No. 2 Hamilton in Class C—The teams played on Feb. 3 and Hamilton outscored Keio 24-0 in the first quarter. Ouch. Nobody wants a laugher to kick off the girls portion of County Center week.
Upset potential: No. 18 New Rochelle in Class AA. Honestly, I don’t like any of the underdogs in the semifinals. (That doesn’t include Mount Vernon or Albertus, whose wins would not be considered upsets.) New Ro over Ossining would be a true upset. The Huguenots are healthy and bring some excellent guard play. Also, check out the next category.
Team most likely to look ahead: Ossining. When I interviewed them on Varsity Insider Chat, Saniya Chong and India Reckard swore up and down that they were not looking past New Ro. I don’t totally believe them. After losing consecutive finals to Mount Vernon, how could they not be thinking about a rematch?
Team most likely to look worse than it really is: Peekskill. It’s been a couple of months since Peekskill played a challenging opponent. I expect an ugly first half as Rye comes out with a fury.
If you like fast-paced action, you’ll be rooting for: Woodlands. The Falcons have no conscience when it comes to blasting up court off a turnover or missed shot. They may miss the ensuing shot, but they’ll keep on running the next time too.
If you had to bet your life on an MVP: Class AA—Saniya Chong, Ossining; Class A—Christa Scognamiglio, Pearl River; Class B—Marley Giddins, Irvington; Class C—Liz Milner, Haldane.
Best rebounder: Class AA—Lubirdia Gordon, Mount Vernon; Class A—Jazmin Garcia, Peekskill; Class B—Alexis Martins, Irvington; Class C—Maia Hood, Hamilton.
Best passer: Class AA—Saniya Chong, Ossining; Class A—Felicia DaCruz, Albertus; Class B—Savina Reid, Briarcliff; Class C—Liz Milner, Haldane.
Better than you thought: Class AA—Caroline Spillane, Ursuline; Class A—Asia Jackson, Peekskill; Class B—Imani Tilford, Woodlands; Class C—Maia Hood, Hamilton.
17 Comments
Does anyone have info on what the teams are doing leading up to the County Center? Are they all scrimmaging to stay sharp? Extra practices? That may have an impact on performance. Just wondering.
How about best coaches in each class
AA Pavella- Mahopac. First season, same girls that went 0-18 last year. Average talent, great and consistent effort. Big turnaround. Congrats
AA Adams
A Henwood
B Maher/Moylan (tie)
c ?
Back to back Champs Coach Moore.. How is she not even mentioned is beyond me!!!!! Don’t talk about the talent, you have to know how to coach the talent, and she absolutely does!!!!!
AA: Moore
A: Moylan
B: Maher
C: ???
Mt. Vernon fan, I’ll give you that about knowing how to coach the talent. She’s a good coach and has done a lot for that program in the last few years.
However, you have a tough matchup against Ursuline and I would concentrate on the task at hand above all. In order to get to the final, you have to win the semi-final.
Absolutely.. I’m quite sure she has the ladies ready for Ursuline…They know how to combat that height well… Should be a great game…
Mt Vernon/ New Ro (Box and one on Chong/stop the fast break?)
Peekskill/ Pearl River
Irvington/Briarcliff
Alexander Hamilton
Wppat,scroll down to (jakes contest picks) and put your picks there just in case you were suppose to. Good luck
AA – Mt. Vernon
A – Peekskill
B – Irvington
C – Hamilton
^coaches
It will be interesting to see what the Rye team comes with against Peekskill on Thursday after suffering a 23 point loss at home against them earlier this season…
@Playoffs I tell you this, Rye has played like a totally different team from what they looked like early in the season. That is not the same team that was beaten by Briarcliff by 20 points and Peekskill by 23 points. I do think that it will be a closer game then the last time the two teams met, but the Peekskill starting five is still better then Rye starting five.
I do believe that Mt. Vernon, Rye, and Briarcliff have gotten better as the season progressed. Mt. Vernon girls have begun to play together and have meshed nicely. Rye has gotten more confident in their abilities and Briarcliff seems to have gotten healthy.
I am not sure Gordon is even the best rebounder on her team. Donisha(?) Watson, the sort of controversial pre season “transfer”, is similar size and much more athletic. While Bird has far superior offensive moves, Watson is a better athlete and seems to get more jacked up for defense than Bird.
But for all the size, the key player for MV is King. When she is aggressive with the ball, driving and shooting the 3, MV is much more dangerous than when they try to slow down and dump the ball in.
@Manny I have watched several Mt. Vernon games this year. Gordon and Watson are similar in size but it ends there. Laburdia is a much better offensive player and when she plays hard she is unstoppable. Watson just cant seem to get it going offensively at all. If Laburdia comes to play no one should be able to stop her! At her size and weight she should be dominating.
I just watched Rye scrimmage Mt. Vernon. And they played great!! They have some big girls on Mt. Vernon. It was just a scrimmage, of course, and both teams were told not to injure each other but based on Rye’s performance I think they have a shot with Peekskill.