Caterino’s 19 leads youthful Greyhounds

By DEAN DELLAMALVA JR.

MVI Sports

The long-awaited debut of the Monessen girls basketball team finally came on Monday night and the Greyhounds did not disappoint their faithful.

Sydney Caterino scored a game-high 19 points and freshman Hailey Johnson added 12 as the Hounds downed short-handed Avella, 61-40, in Section 2-A.

Monessen (1-0, 1-0) also got big contributions from two other freshmen off the bench as Sidney Campbell added nine points and MyAsia Majors chipped in seven.

Greyhounds head coach Janine Vertacnik was extremely happy with her team’s scoring and unselfish play.

“To open up with 61 points with four freshmen and a sophomore, I thought they gelled well,” Vertacnik said. “They are very unselfish and they get along so well. Three or four of them are related so it’s almost like a family out there. They really seem to find the open girl.”

It was a difficult game for the Eagles, who played the game with only one substitution. Avella (0-1, 0-1) began to lose their legs in the third quarter, a result of the inconsistency in preparation due to the pandemic.

“We had a little more standing around than we probably should have had,” Eagles coach Mike Drazich said. “We’ll get better when we get in better shape. It’s been a difficult start to the season obviously; the disjointed practices, the disjointed conditioning, disjointed everything.”

Avella started the game faster than the Greyhounds. They jumped ahead 9-3 behind early points from Katie Dryer, who scored 10 of her team-high 18 points in the first quarter.

But Monessen got the motor going behind two 3-pointers from junior Zalendria Hardison and Caterino, who scored nine points in the opening quarter. The Hounds ended the period with a 15-6 run and led 18-15.

The second and third quarters were the difference in the game. The Greyhounds won the second, 14-5, with five different players scoring and led 32-20 at the half. They outscored Avella 16-9 in the third as Johnson and Campbell each tallied six points. Defense and rebounding were key, according to Vertacnik.

“Defensively, we had a really good second half,” Vertacnik said. “Mercedes Majors is a very strong backside rebounder and Johnson was really cleaning up the glass. She knew where the ball was going to be and was able to put it back up.”

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