MONT TO FACE MERCY
22nd Mar 2009
DCU Mercy will meet Team Montenotte Hotel Cork in the National League Final after both sides came through their semi final two legged affairs against Bausch & Lomb Wildcats and UL Aughinish respectively.
DCU Mercy have booked their place in the final after an 81-60 win on Sunday over Bausch & Lomb Wildcats rounded off a 175-133 result on aggregate.
Wildcats put in a gutsy display, leading 36-34 at the break but the Dubliners put in a strong display after the re-start with Suzanne Maguire in excellent form.
Melanie Thomas signed off the season for Wildcats with 17 points, while Mercy’s US star Jill Martin secured 14 points.
“It was a tough game,” said Ingle. “Wildcats played well but we managed to put in a good third quarter and it helped us to go on and secure the home win.
“The whole season has been a tremendous effort by the players and we deserve to have got this far. We have to re-focus now and turn our attention to next weekend, which will be a tough game against Montenotte.
Team Montenotte Hotel Cork remain on track for a cup and league double but only after a nervy 122-114 win on aggregate over UL Aughinish.
Montenotte secured a 13 point win away to UL last weekend but the Limerick side produced a fine display to win 66-61 at Little Island on Saturday night.
Kirsten O’Neill hit 11 points in the first quarter with Maura Guiney contributing 9 to put UL right back into the game with a 29 - 17 lead at the end of the first quarter.
Montenotte’s success over the past few seasons has been built around their superb defense and once again they proved so effective limiting O’Neill and Guiney to 4 points between them in the second quarter. American Jennifer Strong was beginning to hurt UL, scoring from jump shots and fast break lay-ups. Gillian Aherne was also showing something of her old form and kept the Limerick side’s scoring ticking over.
With the final quarter remaining UL led by 5 on the night meaning they had to outscore Montenotte by more than 8 in that crucial last period. UL did increase the lead to 8 points with 5:11 on the clock. Once again the hugely impressive Montenotte defense stepped up. Walsh, Michelle Fahy and Niamh Dwyer all played out of their skins and had cut the deficit to 3 points with just over 2 minutes remaining. At that stage the comeback looked out of sight for the visitors and even though they added two more to their lead it proved too little too late.