HERSHEY — Lew Dellegrotti stood in one of the dimly lit hallways inside the gymnasium at Milton Hershey High School, quietly offering thanks to every one of his Shikellamy players following their season-ending loss Wednesday to Archbishop Wood in PIAA Class AAA playoff action.
The veteran Braves coach probably could have started rehearsing his speech right after the opening quarter, because nothing short of the Vikings walking off the court in protest, or non-playing members of the University of Connecticut women’s squad suddenly having scholastic eligibility and joining the District 4 champions, was going to change the final outcome.
Shikellamy just picked the wrong night to run into a buzzsaw, with no answer to cut off the power.
Archbishop Wood shot 10-for-12 from the field, including seven-for-seven from 3-point range, while throwing wave after wave of defensive pressure at the Braves en route to a 31-8 lead after eight minutes in advancing to the quarterfinal round of state action with a convincing 69-25 victory.
“I can’t remember the last time I’ve watched a team shoot the ball like they did in the first quarter,” Dellegrotti said. “We knew they were good coming in and their defense liked to come at you, but no matter who had the ball and their position on the court, it was up and in before you knew what hit you. To shoot that accurately from 3-point range was unreal.”
Jenna Swope, Lauren Nealon and Samantha Greenfield combined for six treys, while Stephanie Keyes added one as the Vikings went up 21-4 against the shell-shocked Braves, who got four points from Dana Reed and two each from Alexis Angstat and Megan Slonaker to finish the first quarter trailing 31-8.
Shikellamy came out in the second period and went right at the Archbishop Wood defense, but the Philadelphia Catholic League entrant, which sent in most of its second unit, continued to sizzle from the perimeter as Keyes buried three consecutive 3-pointers from the deep corner. Grace Mirack, whose father was born in Shamokin, contributed four points to help the Vikings take a 45-14 advantage into the break.
“I’ll be honest with you, we shoot well but not anything like you witnessed in the first half,” Vikings’ coach Jim Ricci said. “We got here two hours before the game was to start and we sat around and I wasn’t sure if that would affect our legs, but I could see after the first few shots we had that extra bounce in our step, and the ball just went in on almost every attempt.”
The Braves continued to battle at both ends of the floor but just couldn’t match the depth of the Vikings, who outscored Shikellamy 20-7 in the third quarter as the hot shooting still continued. Keyes, Christine Verrelle, Jackie Pierson, Nealon and Mirack all nailed a trey each in the outburst.
Reed, who led the Braves (22-5) with 10 points, collected five points in the quarter and Slonaker added two.
“We come at you with 11 players every game and when I saw how wide the court was here, that just made me feel better,” Ricci said. “I respect Shikellamy’s program and we knew they had good players from the reports we got on them. Today, we just had one of those games where the offense and defense were outstanding against a quality team.”
Junior forward Emily Daddario tallied only three points but had a solid night on the boards with 12 rebounds, battling from start to finish against the taller Vikings defenders.
“This was a great experience for our program to be in a game like this,” Dellegrotti said. “We experienced first-hand just what it takes to compete at this level and what we need to do in order to not only be competitive but win.
“No one has to hang their heads, because we played hard right to the end and didn’t back down. We’ll be back.”
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