Womens National Super League
Portlaoise Panthers 52 UCC Glanmire 87
The Portlaoise Panthers’ women side have been performing well of late with their recent win against WIT Wildcats giving them breathing space from relegation.
On Saturday night the Panthers could not match that performance against one of the best sides in the Nation Super League and 2018 National Cup finalists, UCC Glanmire. In front of a large crowd in St Mary’s hall, Glanmire dominated from start to finish but the display from Portlaoise was not to discredited.
The game opened in well for Portlaoise with Tracy Fallon and Sinead Melia grabbing scores, but it wasn’t long before Glanmire began to stretch the Portlaoise defense and open up a good lead. Portlaoise had a fair share of the possession but they were unable to find the hoop with poor finishing, much down to the good defensive pressure from Glanmire, who held the lead at the end of the first quarter.
Glanmire’s Gráinne Dwyer and Ashley Prim controlled the ball well for Glanmire in the second quarter while Claire Rockall was finding her range with a series of good shooting. The Panthers struggled to get a foot hold in the game, but Stephanie Schmid was beginning to get the Panthers moving.
Fellow American, Stephanie Poland, was also getting more involved, picking up good rebounds and baskets. But it was still Glanmirewho were firmly in the driving position by the half, scoring over 90% of their shots in the third quarter, which left them leading 49-25.
The third quarter didn’t bring about the improvement needed for Portlaoise to mount a comeback, and Glanmire still had it relatively easy when it came to getting to the basket, albeit less accurate than before the break. Claire Rockall picked up a lot of turn overs and even finished some of them off.
The downfall for the Portlaoise women was in attack, as they couldn’t find the space to get away a good shot at Glanmire’s basket. They ran down the shot clock on six occasions in the third quarter and but still managed to keep a reasonable margin to fight back towards in the fourth quarter.
They started the fourth quarter again in slow fashion and Claire Rockall punished the Portlaoise side for their sluggishness in attack and Glanmire stretched an unassailable lead. But the Portlaoise side didn’t give up their fight, and Stephanie Schmid and Maeve Phelan pushed for scores with both landing some good long range two pointers and both landed great shots beyond the arch. But it was all too little too late for Portlaoise as they lost out 87-52.
PORTLAOISE PANTHERS: Maeve Phelan, Tracy Fallon, Sinead Melia, Stephanie Schmid, Stephanie Poland, Maeve O’Sullivan, Deirdre Tomlinson, Sharon Melia, Catherine Ashe.
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