Trinity girls spring trap on Belle Vernon
Trinity’s Sierra Kotchman tries to drive past Belle Vernon’s Alyssa Larson during Thursday’s game.
Trinity’s Natalie Cappelli, front, battles Belle Vernon’s Taylor Kovatch for a loose ball during Thursday’s playoff game at Canon-McMillan. Trinity won, 65-27.
Trinity’s Sierra Kotchman shoots in front of Belle Vernon’s Ashley Russella during Thursday’s game.
CANONSBURG – When opponents see the Trinity High School girls basketball team play defense for the first time, Hillers senior center Mary Dunn and coach Bob Miles know what their rivals are thinking.
The Hillers use a 2-3 zone – something of a relic these days – as their primary defense. And in modern basketball circles, that must mean Trinity can’t play defense, right? After all, conventional wisdom is that only bad defensive teams utilize zones because they can hide weak defenders, stop dribble penetration and force the opponent to play on the perimeter.
At Trinity, however, the Hillers have turned that 2-3 trapping zone – think Syracuse’s style of zone defense – into their secret weapon. The Hillers’ defense – not their high-scoring offense – has carried them to 19 victories this season.
The latest came Thursday night, a 65-27 thumping of tempo-minded Belle Vernon in the first round of the WPIAL Class AAA playoffs at Canon-McMillan High School.
“A lot of teams probably think we play man-to-man defense because all the top teams play man, right?” asked Dunn, who dominated against Belle Vernon with game highs of 24 points and eight rebounds.
“We like to shake it up and confuse a lot of people by playing zone. … We believe defense is definitely more important than offense. That’s why we spend 75 percent of the time in practice working on defense.”
And practice made perfect on this night, at least for the first 9½ minutes.
Trinity shut out Belle Vernon (10-14) in the first quarter and didn’t allow a point until the Leopards’ Keira Boff made a baseline jumper with 6:33 left in the second quarter. By that time, Trinity had forged a 15-0 lead.
Belle Vernon entered the game determined to slow the pace and work extended offensive possessions against the Trinity zone. But the second-seeded Hillers (19-3) trap, trap and trap again out of the 2-3 and they harassed Belle Vernon into 20 consecutive empty possessions – nine resulting in turnovers – before the Leopards scored.
“We call that our Syracuse defense, where we can trap on the wings,” said Miles. “We’ve grown into more of a zone team. We have length and we’re strong in the middle. (Natalie) Cappelli does a great job of getting out on the wing and trapping. Our players are starting to understand their roles.”
Belle Vernon entered the game on a bit of a roll, having won five of its last six, including a preliminary round victory over Central Valley. The Leopards, however, don’t have the size to match Trinity’s front line, so they wanted to play the game at a pace more suited for a rest home than a basketball court.
“We anticipated they would try to hold the ball,” Miles said. “With our length, we thought we could take away some passing and driving lanes. We thought they would dribble into something or throw the ball away, which is what happened.”
Belle Vernon was 0-for-9 from the field in the first quarter and committed 15 of its 23 turnovers in the first half.
“I knew we couldn’t go basket for basket, run-and-gun and attack with Trinity,” Belle Vernon coach Lisa Fairman said. “We had to hold the ball.
“That’s not the way we play. Running and gunning got us here, but I was thinking (slowdown) is how we have to play in this one. You just hope your players are strong enough mentally to do what they have to do.”
Though it did not score, Belle Vernon was down by only 11 points after one quarter. The Leopards managed to pull to 17-7 in second quarter after a layup by Kelsey Green, but Trinity closed the first half on a 16-0 run that covered four minutes.
Dunn scored eight consecutive points in the run and Delaney Elling made it 33-7 at halftime by converting a three-point play off a nifty pass by Alayna Cappelli. Dunn, who had a game-high eight rebounds, scored seven more points in the third quarter, which ended with Trinity leading 45-16.
“Trinity is a well-rounded team,” Fairman said. “They have bench players who could start for most teams.”
Green was Belle Vernon’s leading scorer with eight points.
Sierra Kotchman scored 14 points for Trinity, which advances to Saturday’s quarterfinals and will play South Park (18-5), which defeated Beaver, 59-48. The Hillers know three more solid defensive games might bring WPIAL gold.
“Defense wins championships,” Dunn said.