PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The Taconic girls basketball team started the season off with a statement as they downed Mount Greylock, 65-22, at home on Thursday night.
It was a pretty lopsided affair as Taconic jumped out on Mount Greylock early and often. It began the game on a 13-0 run, keeping Mount Greylock scoreless for more than four minutes. After a quick 7-0 start, Mount Greylock called a timeout to stop the bleeding, but it didn’t seem to help. Taconic was scoring in all sorts of ways including in transition off of easy steals. Ciany Conyers led the way with 16 points, while Aliya Phillips added 14, and Taea Bramer had 11. Faith Cross also added 10 points, giving Taconic (1-0) four starters in double figures.
Mount Greylock (0-1) was led by Maddy Ross with 14 and Emma Gilooly with eight. The only bright spot of the game for Mount Greylock came from Ross, who recorded back-to-back steals for a bucket late in the first quarter to help try and close the gap. Unfortunately for the Mounties, they were unable to do so, and the visitors ended the first quarter in a 17-6 hole.
The second quarter saw much of the same with high pressure from Taconic forcing Mount Greylock into turnovers. The score nearly mirrored the first quarter and Taconic went into the break with a commanding 31-12 lead.
“I was really proud of how we came out defensively,” Taconic coach Matt Mickle said. “We talked about good intensity and being unselfish, I was really happy with how we shared the ball today. We rebounded well and shot the ball well, but I was mainly happy with how hard they played on defense.”
That defensive intensity Mickle was happy with in the first half continued in the second, as his team held its opponent to just four points in the quarter. Taconic also produced its biggest quarter of the game with 24 points. Taconic widened the gap and got its bench involved for most of the fourth quarter as it cruised to an easy opening night win.
Taconic is coming off a defeat in the Western Mass Division 2 title game from last year with six returning players who are hungry to win it all this year.
“The girls talk about it a lot getting back to that Western Mass Finals, hopefully getting a different result,” Mickle said. “But that is the goal, and the six girls we have back on the team that’s our focus, and hopefully we can obtain that goal.”
They are off to a good start and will look to build off this early momentum Monday at Hoosac Valley. As for Mount Greylock, they will go back on the road Tuesday against Wahconah.
