Wantagh sharp in win over South Side

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Senior Julianna Kissane ignited a 16-point run in the final three minutes of the first half as seventh-seeded Wantagh extended its lead over No. 10 South Side to 21 and never looked back on the way to a 67-50 victory in a Nassau Class A girls’ basketball playoff matchup last Friday.

Kissane scored 11 of her 19 points during the outburst, including a buzzer-beating trey off a nifty assist from sophomore Jenna Kaufmann, and junior Caitlin Albanese scored seven of her game-high 25 points in a second quarter that saw the Lady Warriors (14-6) outscore the visitors by a 26-8 margin. Senior Jenna Lopez had 13 points and sophomore Katie McMahon added 12 for the Lady Cyclones, who finished 16-5.

“Our offense has been clicking more and more,” Wantagh head coach Stan Bujacich said. “Julianna’s picked up her offense since the middle of the season and Caitlin’s always there offensively. They feed off one another.”

Sophomore Julia Wilkinson had 12 points and junior Brianna Derham came off the bench and added a trio of three-pointers for Wantagh, which earned a quarterfinal home game thanks to No. 15 Locust Valley’s stunning upset of No. 2 Sewanhaka.

“Getting a home playoff game was a goal we set at the beginning of the season,” Bujacich said. “Having another one is icing on the cake. We don’t know much about Locust Valley, but we’ll get to work.”

South Side, which won an outbracket playoff game against Lynbrook two days earlier, fell behind the Lady Warriors by 24 early in the third quarter but didn’t go down without a fight. The Lady Cyclones got baskets from four different players — Lopez, McMahon, senior Kendall Kelly and freshman Sydney Rathjen — in a 9-0 run and eventually cut the margin to 10 with just under three minutes remaining.

“We had one bad quarter,” South Side head coach Dan Ferrick said. “They shot the ball really well in the second quarter, including a bunch of threes, and we struggled from in close. It wasn’t because of a lack of effort. The shots just didn’t fall.”

Wantagh trailed just once — 14-13 early in the second — in its first postseason victory in three seasons. Albanese scored nine of its 13 first-quarter points and had 16 at halftime. Just as importantly as its torrid shooting, Bujacich credit his team’s defensive effort.

“They’re aggressive and athletic and deep,” he said. “We focused on stopping their bigs down low.”

Junior Angela Labenberg led the defense in the frontcourt before leaving the game midway through the fourth quarter with a shoulder injury. Her status for Wednesday’s game against Locust Valley is up in the air.

Lopez, Kelly, McMahon and junior Kelsey Barrett sparked South Side’s final push, but Wantagh drained all but one of its 10 foul shots in the fourth to seal the outcome. Albanese was 7-for-8 from the line on the night.

“They hit their free throws down the stretch,” Ferrick said. “They did a nice job after we put a little pressure on them late.”