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Swampscott spoils Danvers' upset bid

Friday, February, 01 By Matt Jenkins
Staff writer

Jenna Mazzaferro cut baseline, posted on the left block and made a spinning layup to tie the score with just 34 seconds to play.

The Swampscott senior captain converted the hoop with such confidence that it appeared to be a designed play out of the timeout Big Blue coach Jack Hughes had just called.

"We ran a ton of designed plays, and that wasn't one of them," Hughes laughed after Swampscott came back from an 11-point second half deficit to beat Danvers 51-46 in overtime.

Mazzaferro made Swampscott's two biggest shots of the night | a long-range 3-pointer with 1:13 to go to cut Danvers' lead to 42-40, then the layup that sent the game into overtime | but she's not exactly the go-to player on a roster that features double-digit scorers Tara Nimkar, Allie Beaulieu, and Kara Gilberg.

The two field goals Mazzaferro had in the final moments of regulation were the only two she had all game against a Falcon defense that was pressuring Beaulieu and Gilberg on the perimeter and collapsing on Nimkar in the post.

Danvers had a game plan and executed it with near flawless precision.

The Falcons got ahead early, leading 15-14 after the first, and increased the lead to seven points (29-22) at halftime. They maintained the lead through three quarters (39-32), but Swampscott found the right defensive pressure at just the right time.

Danvers' 1,000-point scorer Danielle Sherry scored nine first quarter points, but was held scoreless through the next two quarters when she faced a diamond-and-one defense. That alone wasn't enough to get the Big Blue (14-1) back in the game, however, because Danvers freshman center Kellie Macdonald dropped eight third quarter points.

"Danvers was hustling like crazy. It was probably the best defense we've seen. I thought we did a good job on Sherry. I don't know what she ended up with, but it wasn't too many baskets," Hughes said. "We tried a few different defenses, but it always comes down to man-to-man and our man was so much better in the last quarter."

The Falcons' (8-6) final field goal of the night came with 1:58 to play in the third quarter when Bailey Potter finished a layup off a pretty feed from Sherry.

Danvers settled for three free throws in the fourth quarter and four more in overtime.

"It looked good midway through the third quarter," Danvers coach Pat Veilleux said. "Our team played great. But we couldn't have predicted a worse ending for us to be honest."

The Falcons put the majority of its defensive pressure on Nimkar, Beaulieu, and Gilberg, daring the other two Swampscott players on the floor to shoot.

Nimkar had to work extremely hard for her 17 points and Beaulieu hit for 13, mostly on jumpers after defensive breakdowns. Gilberg finished with six on hardly any open looks, and Mazzaferro had seven.

Sherry, meanwhile, had all of Danvers' overtime points and ended up with 15. Macdonald was impressive for Danvers, scoring 11, and Potter had nine off the bench.

"They know how to put the game away when they get the chance," Veilleux said of Swampscott. "We did everything we wanted to do through the whole game, honest to God. We were a couple of plays away from a pretty decent upset in my book. I can't fault our effort, but good teams find a way to win late in the game like that."