Serra Catholic turnovers lead to Jayhawks’ rout

By JEREMY TEPPER

MVI Sports

In just about every Serra Catholic boys game, there seems to be a common factor that turns the game one direction or the other.

In the wins and close games, the Eagles hold onto the ball, evidenced by their 80-67 win against Clairton Thursday. They only turned it over nine times.

In the losses, Serra Catholic is a lot sloppier. Friday’s game against Jeannette fell into the latter category, as the Eagles (2-8, 2-5) turned it over 32 times and fell to the Jayhawks, 73-46.

“You just can’t win games with all those turnovers,” Eagles coach A.J. Corso said. “Some of these kids out there are young. I’m playing some sophomores and some juniors that didn’t really get varsity time last year. It’s just the growing pains of a young team.”

Jeannette did its part to rattle Serra Catholic’s offense, switching over to a press primarily in the second half to balloon its lead from 35-29 to its final margin of victory.

“When they started that press, you could see our guys weren’t ready to handle that pressure,” Corso said. “It’s the same type of press that OLSH ran against us.”

The Jayhawks’ offense, too, was quite balanced and effective. They made the extra pass and found the open man. Ryan Kimmel, Anton Good and Keith Rockmore each reached double figures in scoring while three others narrowly missed that mark.

“They’re a pretty well-balanced team and it’s hard to match up against them,” Corso said. “And on top of that, they’re great at fastbreak scoring. It’s tough when they’re that well-rounded.”

To read the rest of the story, please see a copy of Saturday’s Mon Valley Independent, call 724-314-0035 to subscribe or subscribe to our online edition at http://monvalleyindependent.com.