Lady Panthers' Late Rally Not Enough Against Prout In D-II Semifinals

The Prout School girls’ basketball team held off a late charge from Johnston High to secure a 43-35 victory Wednesday at Rhode Island College and a spot in the Division-II Championship.

“I can’t even put my thoughts into words, I never thought that this would happen this year,” Prout senior Jordan Oswinkle said.  “Our team came together and we got what we wanted, this was our goal in the end.”

The Crusaders will face Mount St. Charles Academy Saturday at 1:30 p.m. at the Ryan Center thanks to its 59-52 come-from-behind victory last night against Rogers High School. 

“How many people can go through their high school career saying they played in a championship game? Not a lot,” Prout senior Emily Caswell said. “To do this in our senior year, it’s our most special year. It’s the last chance you get, and me and Jordan said that if we are going to do it, we’re going to do it this year.”

The Mounties (20-1 D-II North, 22-1 overall) are the hottest team in D-II, having won 21 straight games after losing their second of the season to Johnston.

“I think if we’re all stepping up, it will always be a good game, but I think we should end up victorious in the end,” Oswinkle said.

The Crusaders reach the finals after coming up short the previous two seasons, losing in the semifinals each time.

“The first year, Woonsocket was the best team and nobody was going to beat them. Last year we got outplayed, outcoached, out-everythinged by Westerly,” Prout head coach Phil Quinn said. “That’s the first thing I said to the kids: Don’t worry about what has happened in the past, all we can control is these 32 minutes.”

Prout held a narrow 19-18 advantage at halftime before Caswell took control of the game to start the second half. 

“Caswell went off,” Johnston head coach Daniel Mazzulla said. “Hindsight being 20/20, we had a mental lapse defensively, we had some miscommunications on the junk defenses and the two threes were back-breakers.”

Caswell scored 11 points in the first eight minutes of the second, including back-to-back 3-pointers to stretch the lead to double digits, as the Crusaders outscored Johnston 16-2 during that span.

“She took the game over, our defense took over and she did,” Quinn said.  “Our defense played great and only gave up two points in however many minutes, but if (Caswell) doesn’t make shots and take the game over it doesn’t happen.”

To the Panthers credit, however, they did not fold despite facing a 35-20 deficit.  Over the next seven minutes Johnston was able to get within four points with 55.2 seconds remaining behind the strong play of seniors Alaina DeNoncour and Gianna Mazzulla.

“We play hard, we’ve got good kids, and they respond well to adversity,” Coach Mazzulla said.  “We talked about how important it is to play hard every single minute, so we’re very happy with their effort, and we could have very easily fallen.”

DeNoncour led Johnston with 15 points, Mazzulla added 10 points and senior Victoria St. Angelo scored all five of her points in the second half.

“They did a nice job. Alaina is a 1,000-point scorer and just a great all around person,” coach Mazzulla said. “Gianna did a tremendous job running the point. We thought one of our Achilles’ heels would be the point position, but she did a nice job.”

As the Panthers narrowed the gap on the scoreboard, the Crusaders did not help their own cause, going 8-for-16 from the free throw line in the final five minutes.

“It was very nerve-wracking when we stopped making free throws,” Quinn said. “I wasn’t worried about them making shots because we held them for so long, but we’ve got to knock down free throws, and that’s the bottom line.”

Ultimately, Prout fell back on what had gotten them to the semifinals to secure the victory: tough interior defense. Oswinkle led the charge on that front, coming up with a pair of critical blocks in the final minute to deter the Panthers’ push.

“I knew my teammates needed help — they lost their girl so I just stepped over and I knew I needed to make a big play there, so I just blocked her shot,” Oswinkle said.

Caswell scored a game-high 23 points for the Crusaders, while sophomore Tori Jedson played well at the lead guard position on her way to 11 points.

“We need other kids to step up, because there are going to be nights that she [Caswell] is off,” Quinn said.  “Tori hit some really big shots, but she also handled the basketball and controlled the team really well tonight.”

The attached video shows senior Alaina DeNoncour driving to the basket for two of her team-high 15 points on March 9 against The Prout School Crusaders.

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