Young, small-ish Salem feeling March Madness magic
Salem’s players and coaches pose for a post-game photo after defeating Plymouth in Wednesday’s district semifinal game at Belleville.
Theoretically, Salem’s girls basketball team is too young (only two seniors are in the rotation) and too small (no six-footers) to still be playing this late in the season.
Don’t tell that to the Rocks.
On Wednesday night at Belleville High School, Salem resembled The Little Engine That Could, breaking away from a 15-13 halftime lead to upend P-CEP rival Plymouth, 39-24.
The Rocks advanced to Friday’s 7 p.m. district final against the host Tigers.
Relentless defense the difference
Salem won Wednesday thanks to a relentlessly scrappy defense and pinpoint second-half shooting, especially from sophomore Lainey Claramunt (15 points) and Elissa Antoun (10 points).
“Every practice, we focus on defense and energy,” said Antoun. “If we have bad energy, coach (Rod Wells) will pull us in and tell us, ‘You have to get the energy up’. When that happens, we reset and we know we better get our energy up again.”
Along with playing stellar defense, Antoun buried back-to-back threes early in the fourth quarter to help the Rocks extend their lead to 32-17.
Antoun’s role with the Rocks has grown in conjunction with her confidence level, she said.
“Honestly, my confidence comes from the coaches at practice saying, ‘If you’re open, shoot’,” she said. “They don’t worry about mistakes with shooting. If we miss, it’s OK, as long as we stay in our rhythm.
Back-to-back daggers
“All of the cheering and the energy in the gym got me going. After I made the first one, I thought ‘Might as well shoot another one’.”
Winners now of eight straight games, the Rocks split their regular-season match-ups with Plymouth, which had a solid season, finishing second in the KLAA West Division and playing Wayne Memorial tough in the conference’s second-place game.
“Our mindset coming into the game was to stay calm and play as a team,” Antoun shared. “The way we looked at it, there was no pressure on us because we were the underdogs.”
Stella Stotz added seven points for Salem in addition to playing game-changing defense.
Plymouth was led by seniors Annie Flavin and Olivia Graham, who both netted seven points.
Ed Wright can be reached at 734-664-4657 or edwright@socialhousenews.com.
