Fitch falls to Poland after early lead
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By ROBERT HAYES
Correspondent
POLAND -- Sometimes early adversity can be just what a team needs to clear the hurdle in front of them. With some opening-night jitters, Poland didn't let the moment -- or the game -- phase them.
Falling behind early, the Bulldogs found a way to break the Falcons' full-court press and stormed back to knock off Austintown Fitch at home by a final score of 60-52.
"Both teams played their butts off. There is no loser in tonight's game. I tip my hat off to Natalie (Lynn) and what she's doing over there. I'll be honest with you, it was a great battle, a great contest, both teams got better from tonight's game," said Poland coach Nick Blanch. "Sarah (Forsyth) and Katie (McDonald) both had foul trouble tonight, both had early fouls and I had to leave them on the floor. We don't have the depth yet to put kids on the floor and keep them on the bench until the third quarter. They had to play through it."
"They remained calm, they listened and they still played aggressive. They played smart and aggressive."
Fitch (1-1) senior Jocelyn Jourdan tallied the first five points of the evening and Poland found the bottom of the net with 4:51 to go in the first after senior Katie McDonald scored on a put-back.
Poland trailed by as much as 20-8 early in the second before a mix of senior Sarah Forsyth and junior Mary Brant found a one-two punch that was effective. Both drove to the hoop, but Brant added in some mid-range jumpers, consistently hitting her shots as the Bulldogs clawed back.
Brant, a five-nine guard, scored a career-high 20 points during the winning effort.
"(We) picked up the intensity, found new options, just breaking the press as fast as we could," said Brant. "Going into halftime, we felt pretty good finally scoring some points, everyone doing their job. I think we can be pretty dangerous especially with everyone else chipping in.
"Me and Sarah (Forsyth), shots were falling for us today, but they're falling for everyone."
After trailing throughout the entire evening, Forsyth tied the contest at 26 all early in the third period. She played a major role during the second half, showing an ability to not just drive and score, but to draw fouls and make opportunities at the free-throw line count.
"We just have to encourage everybody, even after a bad play, maybe tell them they got it, and just pick them up," Forsyth said after scoring 17 points. "Just driving to the hoop, that's going to be my biggest thing this year, just being aggressive.
"It works really well because the entire team is able to incorporate and bring different stuff to the table. Our passing, shooting, everybody does something different. It's honestly a huge win for us, I'm so excited after tonight, I know everybody is going to be excited going into Thursday."
A late 11-2 run by Poland (1-0) helped fend off the Falcons, who came into the contest with their opener already under their belts. Jourdan paced Fitch with 13, senior Zayda Creque added 12, and junior Destanie McCullough pitched in with 8.
Poland senior Ava Nicholudis and McDonald tacked on seven points a piece.
"We definitely got gassed, and some of these girls on this team are still very young, and it became a lot of mental mistakes where Poland pressed picked up as well, and we kinda freaked out a bit," said Austintown coach Natalie Lynn. "The turnovers were just astronomical, it was, we were dribbling it down the court, we might have gotten it off a steal, we just threw it in the other team's hands.
"It was like we took two steps forward, one step back every time. We just couldn't catch the break to refocus."
With game one in the books, it's the little things that added up.
"Being coachable is the biggest reason that we were able to adjust and do things well," Blanch said. "The girls listened. There's no ego, there's no don't talk to me, I know what I'm doing, it's here's what they're trying to do, and here's what I need you to do in response, and they did that, and did it well.
"When you play our style of game, you're going to make mistakes that give up layups, that's part of the nature of what we do. But you can't do it as many times as we were doing in the beginning. But we settled down, made the adjustments, got the jitters out of the way, and played Poland basketball."
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