Defense delivers season sweep over Dartmouth for Bishop Stang girls basketball

DARTMOUTH — To catch a season sweep of rival Dartmouth, Bishop Stang head coach Julie Letourneau knew the Spartans had to find a way to contain Kasey Oliver and Katherine Cheesebro.

Letourneau drew up a triangle-and-two defense that had junior Bridget Markey on Cheesebro and junior Kate Carreau guarding Oliver.

“We played a triangle-and-two defense today because we know that they’re Dartmouth’s two strongest players so we just figured if we could make their lives challenging it would play into our hands,” Letourneau said. “I just taught it to them yesterday. I told them the only way it’s going to work is if you communicate and they did a really good job of communicating. I’m really psyched with their performance tonight.”

Stang held both Cheesebro and Oliver below their season averages and made them work for their 16 combined points as the Spartans beat Dartmouth 45-28 on Friday night in non-league girls basketball action at the Carlin Lynch Activity Center.

“Tonight I just thought it was our best half of basketball yet in terms of executing our game plan, working together as a team and running our zone offenses,” Letourneau said. “We just have to execute and they did and I’m so proud of them.”

Even though the Spartans have lost just two games — to St. Mary’s and Bishop Feehan — Letourneau said they’ve struggled getting off to good starts.

That wasn’t the case against Dartmouth as Stang built a quick 8-0 lead in the first two minutes.

“Every game we play we come out and we’re down 6-0 or 9-0 and I talked to them and I said, 'I want you to come out with intensity,'” Letourneau said. “They just stuck to the game plan and they ran it.”

Carreau added, “When we have high intensity and we come out and play like we just did, it really shows how hard we work for it.”

Carreau had five of Stang’s first eight points and finished with 11 for the game.

“She’s a huge asset,” said Markey of Carreau. “She hustles more than anyone on the team and she’s the fastest person on the court. She’s a super good ball handler and shooter. Having her back is great.”

Carreau missed her freshman year because of knee surgery for a torn ACL she suffered while playing soccer in May of 2019. She returned last year for a COVID-shortened season and has emerged as a leader for the Spartans this winter.

“When a person comes back from an intense injury, it’s hard to come back from that mentally and she struggled a little bit last year, but this year I see a totally different kid,” Letourneau said.

Carreau has recently taken on the point guard duties to free up Markey.

“There’s been a couple of games this year where I feel like Bridget has put a lot of pressure on herself to be the offensive person and she forces the offense and it throws us out of our team offense,” Letourneau said. “We’ve had some discussions about it and I’ve said, ‘You don’t have to do that.’ She’s starting to develop more and establish the trust and pass off. Kate is running the point right now so that Bridget doesn’t feel it’s all on her shoulders and Kate is doing a great job. Both of them together are outstanding.”

Markey had a game-high 13 points, five rebounds and three steals. Many times she had assists to teammates under the basket and on the fast break.

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“That’s my teammates knowing where to be at all the time,” she said. “That’s on them. They’re always open and we can trust each other.”

Markey said that playing in a very competitive Catholic Central League has prepared the Spartans for tough opponents like Dartmouth.

“We were put in this new league and we’re playing the top teams in the state,” she said. “We have a short bench so I think in practice we work twice as hard and as a team we’ve really grown since the beginning.”

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Letourneau agreed, “Playing those tough teams makes us even stronger. That’s helping our mental toughness. That’s what I spoke to them about in the huddle after the game was that we have to establish mental toughness and be able to perform under intense pressure and our league is full of intense pressure and they were able to do it so well tonight.”

HOW IT HAPPENED

Junior Eleanor Senna had six of her eight points in the first quarter as Stang led 17-8 after the first eight minutes.

The Spartans extended their lead to 29-16 entering halftime thanks to eight points apiece from Markey and Carreau.

“We had them penciled as the people we had to pay attention to and we did,” said Dartmouth head coach Scott Richards. “They’re just really good basketball players.”

Dartmouth pulled within 11 (29-18) early in the third quarter when Cheesebro scored on a fast-break layup but that was the closest the hosts would get the rest of the way.

“That’s a really good basketball team,” Richards said of Stang. “They made shots and we were not making shots. That’s a recipe for not winning. I can’t complain. We worked really hard. We fought until the end. In the end, we didn’t make enough shots.”

WHAT IT MEANS: With the win, the Spartans improve to 7-2. Next week, they visit Fontbonne on Thursday. … The loss was the second-straight for Dartmouth, which fell to 5-4. It visits Old Rochester (8-1) next Thursday. “We have time to regroup which we’ll do,” Richards said.

ROLE PLAYERS FOR STANG: “Leah Katz tends to be more shy on offense and tonight I saw her change a little bit. She was calling for the ball. Sophie Caldwell is the head of the triangle. She’s directing everyone. Everyone looks to Sophie because she’s so intelligent and she knows every play inside and out on the court and gives directions.”

LETOURNEAU: “Some of my bench players are starting to evolve and develop. I love my junior class and their fantastic and these other girls work just as hard in practice and they want it just as badly.”

RICHARDS: “We fought hard all game. We struggled really hard to make shots. We got some good open looks early that we didn’t knock down and I think that affected our confidence moving forward.”

TEAM STATS: Dartmouth shot 12 of 51 (23%) from the field and 4 of 11 (36%) from the free-throw line while turning the ball over 17 times. Bishop Stang was 18 of 51 (35%) from the floor and 4 of 12 (33%) from the stripe with 17 turnovers.

BISHOP STANG 45, DARTMOUTH 28

Bishop Stang

Bridget Markey 13 (2), Sophie Caldwell 3, Leah Katz 2, Kate Carreau 11 (3), Eleanor Senna 8, Alexandria James 8.

Dartmouth

Kasey Oliver 5, Ava Crane 6, Alex Cojocaru 2, Katherine Cheesebro 11, Haley Jenkins 4.

Bishop Stang;17;12;12;4 — 45

Dartmouth;8;8;10;2 — 28

This article originally appeared on Standard-Times: Bishop Stang beats Dartmouth in girls basketball for season sweep