Prario leads Broncos to home rout
Bronco scores 19 points in win over North Smithfield.
BURRILLVILLE — Defense hasn’t been a problem for the North Smithfield girls basketball team this season, but the Northmen hadn’t seen a onetwo scoring punch like Burrillville’s Sam Prario and Alyssa Simpson yet this campaign.
In Tuesday night’s showdown for first place in Division III at the Broncodome, the young Northmen held their own for the first half, but the deeper, more experienced Broncos used their advantages in the second half.
Prario dominated the perimeter with a game-high 19 points, while Simpson attacked the paint for 19 points, as the Broncos quickly pulled away in the second half. North Smithfield was held without a field goal for over half of the final 16 minutes, as the Broncos secured an emphatic 62-32 victory.
“I’ve been shooting more and trying to drive the ball to the hoop more because normally I’m just passive and try to get a lot of assists,” Prario said. “They played a 2-3 zone, so it was easy to drive the ball down the middle of the defense and once one of their top defenders got into foul trouble, they weren’t as aggressive. This shows us that we can get far.”
“We’re gaining confidence as the season goes along,” Burrillville coach Sam Stanton said. “The girls are getting more comfortable with the ball and they’re getting more comfortable with each other. It usually takes us a half to get comfortable with what the other team is doing and what is going to be called in the game. They just reacted well to what happened. This is what I feel like we can be, so I would like to keep it.”
North Smithfield (10-2 Division III) received a teamhigh 10 points from sophomore Laura Matchett, but the road side never led even though the Northmen were in the game for the entire first half.
“We were in this game, but we just didn’t come to play today,” North Smithfield coach Ariana Stanton said. “They outplayed us and outhustled us; they wanted the ball more. They came in and they commanded the floor. We backed down and let them get into our ears a little bit. We played inexperienced, which you can’t do when you have a target on your back like we did coming into this game.”
Burrillville (10-1 Division III) outscored the Northmen 37-9 over the final 18 minutes to take a one-game lead on North Smithfield, Woonsocket and Tolman for the No. 1 seed in the playoffs. The Broncos finish the regular season with road games against the Tigers and Villa Novans.
“We can do this on any given night, but it all comes down to confidence,” Sam Stanton said. “They have to all work together and it has to be a team effort 100 percent of the way. That’s what they did to win this game.”
North Smithfield made it a two-point game (25-23) with just over two minutes left in the half on a Skylar Mette three-point play, but Prario sent the Broncos into halftime with a five-point lead on a late 3-pointer. The Northmen simply couldn’t get anything going offensively in the second half, as the Broncos rode the play of Simpson and Prario to pull away.
Burrillville built a 43-27 advantage midway through the half and the gap continued to grow. By the time Sam Stanton pulled her starters with two minutes left in regulation, the Broncos were up by 26 points.
“We have to play together, we have to play with confidence and we have to be aggressive – we didn’t do any of those things,” Ariana Stanton said. “Burrillville 100 percent earned that win. We prepared to slow down [Simpson and Prario], but they kept coming at us. This group is so young, that we’re going to learn from their mistakes. They haven’t been at this level, so they needed a reality check that it can be taken away that quickly.”
Mette chipped in with eight points for the Northmen, while sophomore Calla Puccetti added seven. For the Broncos, Morgan Bassett scored five of her seven points in the first half, while Molly Brown controlled the paint in the second half to finish with six.
Twitter @Bran
Photo by Michelle Menard