Lady Panthers fall to Saints

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The Johnston Lady Panthers’ bid to upend the Lady Saints of Saint Raphael Academy fell short this past Tuesday night in a key Division II-North match-up at Johnston High School.

The Saints’ Kaylee Oliver made two three-point shots in the final four and a half minutes of the game, as Saint Raphael hung on for a 64-56 victory to remain alone on top of Division II-North with an 8-0 record. The Panthers fell to 7-2 in league play in a game that was tied, 30-30, at halftime.

“Saint Raphael is a good team, we knew what we were in for tonight,” said Johnston head coach Chris Corsinetti. “We lost our focus on defense a couple of times, missed some defensive assignments and we let Oliver shoot, we did not get to the screens. We did not execute our offense and you have to give credit to Saint Raphael’s defense, they did a nice job. We are not going to win many games when the other team puts up 64 points, but the game was lost on the defensive end for us.”

Saint Raphael, who never trailed in this game, got off to a quick 6-0 lead, until Johnston’s Karina Mattera got her team on the board with two of her team-high 21 points. The Saints led by as many as 10 points in the first half, but Mattera came up big, scoring seven points in the final minutes to cut the lead to just two points.

Isabella DiRaimo, who was coming off of a 30-point performance against Scituate in Johnston’s last game, also helped cut into the Saints’ lead with a shot from three-point land. With Johnston trailing 30-28, freshman Jordan Moretti sank two free throws to knot the game at 30, as the teams headed into the break.

The Saints went on an 11-3 run to open the second half, as the Panthers committed seven turnovers in the first five minutes.

The Panthers would chip away at the lead, as Mattera hit a deep three-point shot and DiRaimo would go coast-to-coast for two of her 16 points. Mattera cut the lead to make it 46-44 with another clutch bucket, but that was as close as the Panthers would get, as Oliver went on to nail two back-breaking three-pointers to up the visitors’ lead to 10 points with 3:36 to go in the game. Oliver would finish with a game-high 26 points.

“I looked at this game at the beginning of the season and thought that it would be the make or break game on our schedule,” Corsinetti said. “Tonight’s game is a game that will come back to haunt us, no question.”

The Lady Panthers will hit the road for three consecutive division games and will not return home until Feb. 3. They will look to rebound tonight at Woonsocket High School, then travel to Cumberland High School on Jan.26.

The Panthers will have a rematch at Saint Raphael on Feb. 17, which will be Johnston’s final regular season game.

“We will have a tough week and a half ahead of us,” Corsinetti said.

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