Girls’ Basketball—

Nighthawks Fall In SWCs, Ready For One Last Home Game

By Andy Hutchison

Combine the fourth quarter and Lauralton Hall and you have a recipe for trouble for the Newtown High School girls’ basketball team.

The Nighthawks, the No. 7 seed, were shutout by host Lauralton Hall, the No. 2 team, in the final period of Saturday night’s South-West Conference Tournament’s quarterfinals. That enabled Hall to break open a 32-25 advantage and pull away for a 46-25 win.

Late in the regular season, Hall averted an upset to Newtown by outscoring the Hawks 11-2 in the final three minutes for an eight-point win.

“They’re an outstanding team and outstanding teams are solid on defense,” Newtown coach Shawn O’Brien said.

The coach added that Hall’s pressing defense takes its toll on a team as the game unfolds. “It wears you down,” he said.

Foul trouble on junior Jordyn Good and on one of the team’s top scorers, senior Morgan Knees, left the Hawks without two regulars on the floor down the stretch which didn’t help matters against one of the SWC’s powerhouse teams. Sara Kelly led the Nighthawks with 10 points in the defeat. Despite the early tourney exit, Newtown’s postseason is not over. While Lauralton Hall (20-1) advanced in the SWC tourney, Newtown (10-11) has spent the week resting and practicing and prepping for the start of state playoff competition.

The Hawks will entertain Brien McMahon (8-12) in a Class LL Tournament qualifying round game Friday at 4 pm. Newtown is the No. 30 seed and McMahon, which comes from the Fairfield County Interscholastic Athletic Conference, is seeded 35th.

“It should be an evenly-matched game,” O’Brien said. “McMahon won eight games in a league that’s similar to ours. The SWC and FCIAC are comparable. Their losses have all come to quality teams.”

Common opponents these teams faced were Masuk and Lauralton Hall. McMahon lost by 10 to Masuk, a rival Newtown split with in a couple of regular season meetings.

The winner of Friday’s qualifying round clash has the unenviable task of traveling to Hartford to face No. 3 Bulkeley, a team that lost just one game this winter. O’Brien believes the Central Connecticut Conference, in which Bulkeley competes, is the toughest in the state.

“The winner of Friday night’s game is going to be stepping into an extremely tough environment in Hartford on Tuesday,” O’Brien said.

The Newtown coach does not want to look past Friday’s game and hopes his team can come out with a win in what will be the final home game for Knees and the other two seniors, Katie Condon and Katie Power. The Hawks beat Immaculate in their Senior Day game, but lost their final regular season home game, to Notre Dame-Fairfield. A win over McMahon on Friday, in addition to prolonging the season, would take a little of that sting away.

“We’d like to leave on a positive note at home,” O’Brien said.