The Millis girl’s basketball team captured its fifth Division 4 Sectional Championship in the past nine years when the Mohawks defeated Douglas 53-27. Having won State Titles in 2009, 2014 and 2015 and losing to Cathedral 45-41 in last year’s championship game Millis was looking to take home another championship this winter. After finishing the year with a 12-8 record playing in the Tri-Valley League the Mohawks were awarded a 12 seed as they entered this year’s Division 4 Central Tournament.
Millis swept through the divisional tournament winning each of its four games by an average of 24.5 points per contest. The Mohawks took out Advanced Math and Science, the five seed, 50-29; Tri-County (4th seed) 49-17; Whitinsville-Christian (16th seed) 37-18 in its closest match and finally Douglas, the number two seed to earn its fifth title.
Millis hooked up once again with Quabog, the Western Division Champion in the first round of the State Tournament. Millis has met up with Quabog the last three years in the first round of the tournament and each time took care of its Western counterpart with ease; defeating them by an average score of 15 points over the three meetings. Unfortunately, for Millis, Quabog finally got the monkey off their back and defeated the Mohawks 61-36 in the first round of the State Tournament. Millis struggled to score while Quabog made the most of their opportunities.
“We forced them to turn the ball over, but we didn’t turn those turnovers into points,” Fallon said. “It was still a 10-point game with 6:45 left; we had used a lot of energy, but were not making any headway. Credit to them as took care of business when they could.”
Meaghan Hourigan led the Mohawks with 13 points, eight of those coming in the first half keeping Millis in the game. During the regular season it was Hourigan who led the Mohawks with an average of 12.5 points per contest, but when the tournament play began, sophomore Abby Clark has stepped up her game. After following Hourigan with 8 points per game during the regular season, the sophomore has produced an amazing 14 points per contest through the tournament.
While a lot of emphasis has been placed on Hourigan by its opponents because of her regular season offense, Clark has been the beneficiary. The second year player has also grown in terms of her game play from a year ago.
Senior Co-Captains Theresa Cerullo and Jessica Wagner have supplied the defensive pressure, while last year’s sixth man, Lydia Flaherty has emerged as this year’s point guard and led the Mohawks offense down court.
Fallon credits the team’s defensive approach to taking it far into the season.
“Our defense is forcing turnovers that lead to our offense,” Millis Coach Dave Fallon said. “Through the years of success our groups have been different, but our style of play (a full court press) has been the same and continues to lead us.”
Issue Date:
April, 2017
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