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Published: 1/13/2012 - Updated: 44 minutes ago
BY STEVE JUNGA
BLADE SPORTS WRITER
Notre Dame's Jayda Worthy (22) knocks the ball loose from Central Catholic's Jazmine Scott during their game as the Eagles knocked off the Irish to improve to 6-0 in the Three Rivers Athletic Conference. THE BLADE/AMY E. VOIGT Enlarge | Photo ReprintsCentral Catholic didn't exactly have favored Notre Dame on the ropes in Thursday night's first-place girls basketball showdown in the Three Rivers Athletic Conference.
But, the visiting Fighting Irish did manage to combine enough offense and defense to remain within three of the Eagles early in the third.
That was until Notre Dame turned the switch on its offensive arsenal and turned a close contest into a 74-43 rout over the final 13 minutes.
PHOTO GALLERY: Central Catholic vs. Notre Dame
Ahead just 36-33 with 5:21 left in the third quarter, the Eagles (6-3, 6-0 TRAC) closed a 24-8 third quarter with a game-breaking 18-2 run.
"I thought if we could dig in defensively, we had some spurts in us," Notre Dame coach Travis Galloway said. "Once we commit to playing defense it really feeds our offense."
Notre Dame senior post player Michelle Holmes, who sat the final 12 minutes of the first half after committing her second foul, still managed to lead the Eagles with 18 points and eight rebounds in roughly 16 minutes of court time.
Holmes had plenty of support as Notre Dame scored in a series of microbursts.
Senior point guard Cat Wells tallied eight of her 13 points in a span of three minutes in the second quarter.
Fellow senior guard Demy Whitaker mixed three 3-pointers to score 11 of her 12 points in a third-quarter span of just 90 seconds.
"We did a better job in the second half of taking pride at the defensive end," Galloway said of the second-half surge. "In the first half we just kind of played defense. We didn't have any pride in it.
"It's nice to have a lot of offensive weapons. It kind of went in waves. In the first half Cat was kind of out of sync and forced a little too much, then got hot. In the second half, Michelle got back into rhythm. And, when Demy gets going, she's probably as good a shooter as anybody."
It was Holmes' cluster of four buckets between the 6:45 and 4:09 marks of the third quarter that ignited the Eagles' impressive surge.
"In the second half I wanted to make sure I didn't come out rocky because I sat out for 12 minutes," Holmes said. "I wanted to make sure I had a good game for my team."
Those individual surges laid waste to the fine offensive work done by Central senior guard Jamie Sobczak, who scored 15 of her game-high 19 points in the opening half to keep the Irish (6-5, 5-2) within 30-27 at the break.
When Sobczak hit an early third-quarter 14-footer, then added two technical free throws at the 5:47 mark, the Irish were within 36-33.
But Central would commit 15 of its total 27 turnovers after that point, and Sobczak was held scoreless for the remainder of the game.
"We just stopped executing," Central coach Marty McGurk said. "We didn't run any offense. It seemed like whoever had the ball felt they had to make the play."
Notre Dame was 30-of-66 (46 percent) from the field, 6-of-14 from the line, and committed just nine turnovers.
After shooting 58 percent (12-of-21) from the field in the first half, Central struggled to a 5-for-18 effort after the break to end up at 17-of-39 (44 percent). The Irish were 8-of-14 at the line and outrebounded the taller Eagles 35-30.
Deonna Murdock had 10 points for Central.
The big win propels Notre Dame into its challenging weekend in the Classic in the Country Invitational in Berlin, Ohio. The unranked Eagles face third-ranked (in Division I) Cincinnati Princeton (9-0) Sunday at 5:15 p.m. and take on 15th-ranked Wadsworth (7-2) on Monday at 3:15 p.m.
"League-wise this was huge because now everybody else has at least two losses and we don't have any," Galloway said. "That gives us a bit of a cushion. It's a great win against a rival, and it's good going into the tough weekend we have coming up."
Contact Steve Junga at: sjunga@theblade.com 419-724-6461, or on Twitter @JungaBlade.
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