Gloucester girls basketball beats Salem, 56-35, to remain undefeated

  • 01/03 - 11:30 AM Girls BasketballFinal
    Salem 35
    Gloucester 56
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GLOUCESTER CITY -- For the undefeated Gloucester girls basketball team, an inefficient start was promptly forgotten when senior forward Kylee Hirst seized control, leading all scorers with eight first-quarter points and helping the Lady Lions to a sizable lead against the visiting Salem Rams.

With Gloucester (5-0) leading by 10 points after the first quarter, Salem made an impressive run to pull to within one in the second. But the Rams' prosperity proved short-lived.

Gloucester finally pulled away from hard-working but undermanned Salem with a big third quarter and went on to a 56-35 victory on Saturday at Gloucester City.

After watching its opening quarter lead evaporate, Gloucester (5-0) developed a clear sense of urgency, tightening up on the defensive end of the floor and — not coincidentally — soon finding rhythm on offense to open a 28-17 lead at halftime.

“When you play great defense,” first-year Gloucester coach George Bakey said, “it gives you an opportunity to get into the flow offensively. If we’re getting stops, those shots we’re getting will eventually fall.”

Limited to just two layups through the first two quarters, Gloucester junior point guard Nikki Velez took over, seamlessly penetrating the paint, knocking down a trio of shots from behind the arc and finding open teammates, and controlled play for the majority of the second half.

“We like to move fast on offense and that’s what we did,” Velez said. “We have to continue to play as a team in order to be successful.”

Despite the lopsided final margin and a flurry of buckets near the conclusion of the first half, Salem was outscored only 15-14 in the second quarter and actually bested the Lady Lions 10-9 in the game’s final frame.

“We just keep talking about it being a process,” Bakey said. “We have to continually get better as a team.”

The first-year head coach made no qualms about Gloucester’s undefeated start to the new season, but reminded his team that it’s still no time to feel satisfied.

“If we get to the point where we start reaching the top of (our) ceiling, then we can be pretty good,” Bakey said. “However, oddly — I know we’re 5-0 — we’ve got a lot of work to do offensively, defensively. But the good thing is that we got great kids that are willing to listen, learn, and they’re starting to understand, yes, we’re 5-0, but we need to get a lot better if we want to get to the point where we’re considered a good team.”

Senior Tiasia Tatem paced Salem with 14 points.

Gloucester benefited from six hits from behind the arc and six points from the free-throw line.

Hirst led all scorers with 18 total points in victory, 12 coming in the first half. Velez provided 13 timely points of her own, including a trio of third quarter 3-pointers that put the game securely out of Salem's reach.

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