Congrats to Coach Pat Veilleux and his Danvers High girls basketball team after an impressive 50-42 opening round victory over arch rival Gloucester in the Division 2 North Section tournament last night in the DHS fieldhouse.
This was my first glimpse of the current edition of the Lady Falcons and they delivered in the clutch, thanks to the accurate fourth-quarter shooting of Kasey Sherry (16) and freshman Hannah Llewellyn (12).
The teams were meeting for the third time after Danvers (13-8) won the first matchup at home comfortably, then lost the last game of the regular season on Cape Ann by a single point.
The rubber game was fascinating, a game of surges. Danvers went up 6-0, then Gloucester put on a run to take the lead. This happened several times during the night until the Lady Falcons turned the game in their favor, running off 11 straight points to grab a 36-30 lead and led the rest of the way.
The No. 5-seeded Falcons seem to have the right combination of talent, inside and out, offense and defense, to make a run in Division 2. They play at No. 4 seed Wilmington, also 13-8, Sunday at 4 in the quarterfinal round, 24 hours after the 19-2 Danvers boys host Minuteman Regional (13-8), in the Division 3 boys quarters in the DHS fieldhouse.
May the good times keep rolling for Danvers High Basketball over the weekend.
Among the 500-plus fans at the game last night was UMass-Lowell athletic director Dana Skinner, Danvers’ greatest basketball player ever, who is the uncle of the talented Miss Sherry. Skinner recently announced that UMass-Lowell is going Division 1 in all sports, a heady undertaking for a Division 2 program, but one which Skinner is anxious to take on.