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Lackawanna League Girls’ Basketball Managed A Big Finish To 10-11 Season
By Tom Robinson

Two of the three teams that ruined Montrose’s playoff run wound up giving the Lackawanna League a special moment in girls’ basketball.

Dunmore and Mid Valley got together before nearly 4,000 fans at the Lackawanna Student Union, formerly the Scranton Catholic Youth Center, for a state Class AA semifinal that determined the league’s first state finalist in girls’ basketball in 17 seasons.

Dunmore ultimately lost, 62-39, in Friday's final to Villa Maria Academy, which took its third straight state championship back to Erie.

Lackawanna League Division 3 champion Montrose fell one spot short of the state tournament when it dropped three of its last four to finish 21-5. The Lady Meteors fell to Dunmore, 50-38, in a seeding game between the league’s two division champions in Class AA and ultimately had its season end with a 48-39 loss to Mid Valley in the district third-place game.

The win over Montrose was the first of four straight playoff victories by Mid Valley, culminating in a 57-56 quarterfinal win over unbeaten York Catholic.

The Spartanettes, who were 25-0 against everyone else, could not, however, get past division rival Dunmore.

Dunmore’s 51-46 victory over Mid Valley March 22 was its fifth of the season over the Spartanettes in as many tries.

The Lady Bucks, who trailed by as many as seven, scored the game’s final six points. Ashley Murray had five of those points to finish with a game-high 19 and help Dunmore land the spot at Penn State.

Danielle Terranella, who averaged 26.3 points for the state tournament, led Mid Valley with 14.

The game was the first meeting between Lackawanna League schools to determine a spot in the state finals since the Bishop Hannan boys defeated Susquehanna, 48-38, in Class A in 1999 at the University of Scranton’s John Long Center.

Dunmore led, 6-2, early in the state final, but then went 11:51 without a point as Villa Maria took charge with 21 straight.

Abbey Steudler hit four 3-pointers while scoring 17 points, Lisa Mifsud was 9-for-11 from the line with scoring 16 and Karlee McBride had 12 points, seven rebounds and five steals.

Murray led Dunmore with 10 points.

“I’m really proud of the effort the girls gave out there,” Dunmore coach Ben O’Brien said.

WEEK IN REVIEW

The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins are already assured of a spot in the American Hockey League playoffs.

The Binghamton Senators are doing their best to join them.

Rookie Robin Lehner made 31 saves for his third shutout Friday night in a 3-0 win over the league-leading Senators.

Jim O’Brien had a goal and assisted on the other two.

Defenseman Andre Benoit connected on the power-play and Ryan Keller scored his team-high 30th goal.

The win was the fourth straight by the Senators and put them five ahead of Worcester in the battle for the Eastern Conference’s final playoff berth. It also broke Wilkes-Barre/Scranton’s five-game winning streak.

COLLEGE CORNER

Jocelyn Dearborn, a senior from Blue Ridge, was named Atlantic 10 softball Player of the Week March 14.

The Fordham University third baseman and leadoff hitter was honored after hitting five home runs in four games at the Cavalier Classic in Charlottesville, Va. Dearborn had a pair of multiple-homer games while going 9-for-16 (.563).

Dearborn’s walk-off homer in the eighth inning lifted Fordham over 25th-ranked Syracuse, 4-3. It was the third win of the season for Fordham over a ranked team. The Lady Rams had beaten Purdue and Texas earlier in the season.

Fordham opened the Atlantic 10 by splitting two games with Saint Louis to make its overall record 15-13.

Dearborn has started all 28 of the games. She leads the team in homers (five), RBIs (14), stolen bases (4-for-4), triples (three) and batting average (.341) and is tied for the lead in doubles (four) and walks (11).

The four-year starter made the Atlantic 10 All-Rookie Team as a freshman, was a second-team, all-star as a sophomore and a first-team, all-star as a junior.

THE WEEK AHEAD

Lackawanna League spring sports scheduled to start in boys’ tennis Monday and boys’ and girls’ track and boys’ volleyball Tuesday.

Baseball and softball league play is scheduled for Monday, April 4.

Montrose is at Mountain View, Elk Lake is at Lackawanna Trail, Forest City is at Susquehanna and Western Wayne is at Blue Ridge in Lackawanna League Division 3 games in both sports.

TOM ROBINSON writes a weekly local sports column for the Susquehanna County Transcript. He can be reached online at RobbyTR@aol.com.

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NASCAR Racing
By Gerald Hodges

Harvick Beats Johnson At California

By Gerald Hodges; The Racing Reporter

FONTANA, Calif. - After five Sprint Cup races into the 2011 season, there have been five different winners.

Kevin Harvick’s win Sunday at California made him the fifth winner.

“We had him (Johnson) beat last year and I gave it away,” said Harvick. “This is our first win this year, but it isn’t because we haven’t had good cars. We’ve had a lot of adversity. Our cars have been fast and we showed it today.”

Kevin Harvick, winner of Sunday's California Cup race. Furnished by NASCAR.

Harvick made a pass around Johnson on the last lap that was about the only dramatic moment of a boring 200-lap race.

Kyle Busch was leading the race after a restart on lap 190. Johnson passed Busch with four-to-go, with Harvick right on his tail. Harvick dogged Johnson until the two cars were going down the back straightaway on the last lap.

Harvick put the nose of his No. 29 Chevrolet under the rear bumper of Johnson’s car and pushed him as they entered the third turn. The extra momentum forced Johnson to slow down a little. Harvick went to the outside, took the lead, then cut down to the low part of the track, as the two cars headed to the checkered flag.

Harvick’s margin of victory was about a car-length.

“We couldn’t hold him off any longer,” said Johnson, who has yet to win a race in 2011. “I was way loose there at the end. I hate to lose a race that close to the finish, but that was all we could do today.”

Kyle Busch led the most laps (151), and had the dominant car for most of the day, but wound up third.

“We lost the handling on the car,” said Busch. “I couldn’t handle it going into the turns or coming out of the turns. We were in position to win, but I couldn’t get it down.”

The remaining top-10 finishers were Matt Kenseth, Ryan Newman, Carl Edwards, Clint Bowyer, Brian Vickers, Kasey Kahne, and polesitter, Juan Montoya.

Kenseth’s fourth-place in the waning laps of the race led three Roush Fenway cars to finish in the top-11. Carl Edwards used a sixth-place finish to claim the Sprint Cup points lead, giving Roush Fenway the lead in both the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series (Ricky Stenhouse Jr.)

Dale Earnhardt Jr. never led a lap and finished 12th.

Tony Stewart had a strong car all day, but wound up 13th.

Top-12 Chase leaders after 5 of 36: 1. Edwards-187, 2. Newman-178, 3. Kurt Busch-177, 4. Kyle Busch-176, 5. Johnson-173, 6. Stewart-170, 7. Menard-164, 8. Montoya-161, 9. Harvick-157, 10. Kenseth-157, 11. Kahne-157, 12. Earnhardt-156.

KYLE BUSCH CONTINUES NATIONWIDE DOMINATION

Thanks to a two-tire call with 13 laps left, Kyle Busch won Saturday’s Nationwide race at Fontana, CA over runner-up Carl Edwards.

It was Busch’s third consecutive win in the Nationwide series and the fourth in the past five races at Fontana. He now has 46 career wins in the series, three short of the series record of Mark Martin, who finished eighth Saturday.

“I think it’s pretty satisfying when you can win one like that,” Busch said. “I mean, it’s great to go out there and kick everybody’s butt and win the race and just come to the media center and go home. But today, it’s a little bit more fun.”

During the last round of pit stops, Kyle Busch was the only driver to put on two tires. All the rest of the leaders took on four.

“I did not think of two tires until we were jacked up on the left side of the car,” Edwards said. “I thought, ‘Man, this is kind of close to the end. I wonder if somebody will take two, but I didn’t really think about it more than that.

“I guess it’s a little bit of shame that it didn’t come down to a real battle at the end, but it very well could have. A little bit of a slower stop on Kyle’s car or a caution or something like that, and it was going to be an insane finish.”

Kevin Harvick finished third. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. ran fourth and took the lead in the series standings by six points over Jason Leffler (11th Saturday). Elliott Sadler came home fifth.

Trevor Bayne, Joey Logano, Mark Martin, Aric Almirola, and Brad Keselowski rounded out the top-10 finishers.

Top-10 points leaders after 5 of 34: 1. Stenhouse-181, 2. Leffler-175, 3. Allgaier-155, 4. Almirola-155, 5. Sorenson-151, 6. Bayne-150, 7. Sadler-149, 8. K. Wallace-140, 9. Scott-138, 10. Bliss-125.

Commentary: Many NASCAR drivers have gotten involved with Twitter and Facebook, some extensively, tweeting practically from the moment they wake up in the morning.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. isn't one of them.

Certainly, he understands Twitter's usefulness and his team's use of it, but he just can't get into it.

“I used to have a Myspace.com page and I used to have a Facebook page, (but) I don't anymore because it was just too much responsibility,” he said. “I felt like you had to plug in and be involved with it so much and I thought personally I don't need to do it. I understand we use it on the business side and how it works for JRM, but personally, you know, it would be fun for about a month and then I would start to feel like it was a job where people expected me to do it.”

Meanwhile Trevor Bayne, the surprise winner of this year’s Daytona 500 still doesn’t have a ride for this year’s All-Star race at Charlotte. His regular team, the Wood Brothers running a limited schedule, without the All-Star race.

There was speculation that Roush Fenway, who builds the Fords used by the Wood Brothers, might sponsor him.

Roush Fenway President Steve Newmark said the team has no plans to sponsor him in the All-Star event.

“It's not anything we've had discussions about,” Newmark said. “We're focused on having Trevor run in Nationwide and try to win the championship. We're hopeful that the Wood Brothers will figure out a way to get Trevor in the All-Star race, but we haven't had any discussions about putting him in any of our vehicles.”

Weekend Racing: It’s back to Martinsville, the oldest and smallest track on the NASCAR circuit for the Cup and Truck teams this weekend. The Nationwide teams are off.

Martinsville opened in 1947 with 750 seats and the track configuration has not changed.

Sat., Apr. 2, Camping World Truck Series race 4 of 24, Starting time: 2 p.m.; TV: Speed.

Sun., Apr. 3, Sprint Cup Goody’s 500, race 6 of 36, Starting time: 12 p.m.; TV: Fox.

All times are Eastern.

Racing Trivia Question: Where is Kevin Harvick’s hometown?

Last Week’s Question: Who is the actual car owner of Jimmy Johnson’s No. 48? Answer. The majority owner is Jeff Gordon.

You may contact the Racing Reporter at hodges@race500.com.

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