The first half of Friday’s Division IV girls’ basketball game between Concord Christian Academy and Newmarket High School ended with a score of 14-9 in favor of the Kingsmen. The second half was a shutout with a final score of 30-9 in the hosts’ favor.
The Concord Christian win vaulted the team to 11-0 on the season and kept them firmly atop D-IV.
Newmarket had several players a full head taller than the tallest Kingsman. But that didn’t stop CCA head coach Rebecca Carlile from deploying a physical game plan that first stalled and then completely shut off the Mules’ offense.
Concord Christian pressed for almost the entire game. On most inbounds, two Kingsmen would flock to the Newmarket player who received the ball. The disruption in the backcourt caused numerous turnovers and kept Newmarket from ever feeling comfortable enough to find a groove.
“You can’t defend someone who has three to four kids bigger than you with just one person. So we just put the onus on the girls to play defense in the collective, and they came through for us,” said Concord Christian assistant coach Matt Smith.
The defense needed to be sharp for much of the game as the Kingsmen offense, which averages 59 points a game, scored a season low.
“Our defense is kind of our strength, especially today. We shot a very low percentage, but the defense carried us today. You can always play good defense sometimes the shots just don’t fall,” said Carlile.
The shots weren’t falling for Concord Christian most of the night. The Kingsmen shot for volume and hit enough to get the win.
Sophomore Taylor Rioux was a lone standout on the offensive end for CCA with nine points off of three 3-pointers, all of which came in the first quarter.
Despite their lack of offensive production, there was no doubt in the effort that Rioux’s teammates put in for the full 32 minutes of game time. Continually the smaller Kingsmen players would outhustle and outmuscle the taller Newmarket players.
“We try to make sure that they go against each other and practice as hard as they can possibly go, which builds their endurance,” Smith said. “Our goal is – and Coach does a great job of this – making sure that practices are harder than games in terms of intensity and in terms of pace, so that when we get in a game like this, that’s a little bit more of a grind. Tiredness is not a factor; execution is.”
The Kingsmen did not look tired. The small but feisty team threw their bodies at loose balls and elevated to block every shot they could. On offense, they constantly swung the ball around, made darting runs, set screens and moved off-ball to create space.
“They are fierce competitors,” said Carlile. “All of our girls are so competitive that even if they’re sucking wind or they get knocked in the neck or can barely walk, they still want to be out there.”
All that heart and hustle has Concord Christian still perfect 11 games in. But they have no time to talk about regular-season records.
“We don’t care about the record,” said Smith. “Our only goal is to try to win a state championship. We’ve never done it. We think we’ve got a team that can compete for a championship, so we don’t care about record. Our goal is the end game.”