Hersey shocks Benet in tournament's first round

Hersey coach Mary Fendley was a little surprised that her girls basketball team was so quiet Wednesday on its bus ride to the Montini Christmas Tournament.

There was a reason for that, and it apparently benefitted the Huskies. They upset third-seeded Benet 61-55 in the first round.

"Long bus ride, so we were all just trying to get our mindset on the game," said senior guard Maesyn Benjamin, who sank a pair of free throws with 1.5 seconds to go that set the final score and put the game out of reach for the Redwings (14-2).

"We did have a long break, so we were trying to get back into basketball mode," said Benjamin, whose team improved to 8-6 and will face Proviso East at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in the second round. "We know what we had to do, so we were just very focused."

Senior forward Erin McGrath scored 8 of her team-high 18 points in the fourth quarter, including a 6-for-6 showing from the free-throw line

"It was quieter than normal," McGrath said, "but we just really wanted to stay focused. We just wanted to go in and play hard and I think we were all a little bit nervous because it was Benet, a very good team."

The Huskies were helped by shooting 86 percent from the free-throw line, which contrasted greatly with Benet, which went 28 percent and missed 11. They also outrebounded the Redwings 24-20. Not bad, considering the height difference in favor of Benet.

"This is huge for us," Fendley said. "I told them before the game that if we keep this close, I have a good feeling. They are stronger than us and taller than us, but I think they bought in to what we asked them to do."

Hersey let 32-30 at the half despite 17 first-half points from Benet sophomore forward Brooke Schramek, who led all scorers with 21 points. They increased that lead to 49-44 at the end of three quarters, and suddenly it looked like the Huskies might just have enough to pull away in the fourth.

They did. They put together an 8-0 run in the space of 1:37 in the fourth highlighted by a layup from junior guard Emily Collins and jumper in the lane by McGrath, who added four free throws in that spurt.

The Redwings weren't done, though. They countered with an 8-2 run of their own in the final 3:41, including a layup off a steal by junior Lauren Stack and a 3 by junior Clara Prasse.

But the play of the game may have come with 53.2 seconds left. Sophomore Kendall Holmes got called for a charge with Benet down just 57-52. Three seconds later McGrath added two free throws. Schramek responded with a layup off a pair of misses with 12.7 seconds to go, but the Redwings didn't score again.

"We missed a lot of shots, period," Benet coach Joe Kilbride said. "We missed a lot of layups and a lot of free throws, and they made a lot of shots, credit them. Our kids probably had a bit of a Christmas hangover maybe and didn't start out at the level we needed."

Benet shot just 33 percent from the field, 23 percent in the second half.