By TONY BELLISSIMO
The Lady Mules managed only a pair of field goals and shot 1-for-10 from the foul line in the third quarter as they fell behind by 12 points after trailing by one at the half. They also had no answer for Hampton Bays center Kelly Cavallo, who scored 13 of her game-high 30 points in the quarter.
We saw them play before and knew Cavallo would be tough to contain, Malverne coach Lisa Gress said. We did the best we could, but she made it hard on us. She-s a strong player.
Cavallo had some help, particularly in the first half from Genna Kovar (nine points) and Rachel Tufano (seven). Junior Brittany Jenkins led the Lady Mules with 11 points. Junior Alisha Steele and sophomore Brianna Cunningham added 10 apiece.
Our goal was to get to the state tournament, so it-s a disappointing loss, Gress said. We-ve got a fairly young team, but most of the girls have played together a long time. We had confidence coming into the game. We felt we were going to do the right things to keep Cavallo in check, but it didn-t work out as planned.
Malverne (11-11) never led. It trailed 6-0 just 51 seconds into a frantic opening quarter that featured 30 points and few turnovers. Jenkins scored nine of her points in the quarter on a trio of three-pointers, the last of which came seconds before the buzzer and brought the Lady Mules within 16-14.
The pace remained upbeat in the second quarter, though both teams struggled to score. Hampton Bays edged ahead by five late in the first half, but senior point guard Alexis Gabbe assisted on baskets by Cunningham and Jenkins inside of a minute to make it 22-21.
After Tufano and Steele traded baskets to start the second half, Cavallo took control. She scored nine straight points during a two-minute spurt that saw Malverne misfire on all six of its free-throw tries. When the smoke cleared, the Lady Baymen had a 33-23 advantage. The Lady Mules were 4-for-16 from the line in the game.
We-ve been a pretty good foul-shooting team, Gress said. It-s uncharacteristic of us to miss as many as we did.
Heading into the fourth quarter, Malverne-s deficit was 12. But the three-time reigning Nassau Class B champs would get no closer than nine.
Comments about this story? tbellissimo@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 204.
