Winnacunnet boys basketball able to adjust to beat Trinity, advance to D1 final

DURHAM - With eight seniors on the roster, Jay McKenna feels he can trust his Winnacunnet High School boys basketball team to figure out what in-game adjustments it needs to make.

So when Trinity went on a run to open the fourth quarter of Wednesday's Division I semifinal, the Warriors coach turned to his players in a timeout to see what they had in mind.

Whatever they came up with worked, as Winnacunnet traded baskets with Trinity for a stretch before pulling away late, beating the Pioneers 61-48 in a game held at Oyster River High School. The win sends the Warriors to the final for the first time since 2010, where they will face Bishop Guertin in the title game Saturday.

"The kids do a great job of making adjustments on the floor," McKenna said. "They do a great job of communicating to us what they think is going to work. We trust them and I think they had confidence. We battled back. I don’t think there was any panic, it was just a matter of figuring out what was going to work for us."

Winnacunnet (11-4) led by nine points going into the fourth quarter and scored on the opening possession to take a 42-31 lead. But back-to-back 3-pointers by Trinity's Royce Williams helped spark an 8-0 run by the Pioneers in just over a minute, making it a three-point game and forcing the Warriors to take a timeout.

"Settle down, we’re OK and just move the ball," McKenna said of the timeout. "It’s funny, we’re at a point now with this group where I can say ‘what do you want to do?’ When you have a less-experienced team, it’s a little more coach driven. With these guys, it’s more player driven. I agreed with them and we were able to put some plays together on both sides and come out of it."

While the Warriors weren't able to pull away at that point, they never let the Pioneers get closer than three points the rest of the way.

"It came down to the defensive end," Trinity coach Keith Bike said. "We pride ourselves on defense and we let them score 40 in the second half. They average about 55, so you’re not going to win games when you let a team score more than they average. A lot of it was free throws and offensive rebounds."

Samuel Andreottola led Winnacunnet with 21 points and Brett Marelli added 13, including 7 of 11 at the free throw line. Overall the Warriors were 20 of 28 at the line, including 15 of 20 in the second half. Eight players scored for Winnacunnet, and a lot of those points came inside the paint.

"They made their free throws, they didn’t turn it over much in the full court," Bike said. "That’s what we were trying to do. It was a hard-fought battle and out kids are going to learn from it. We tried to make it a full-court game, but in the end, it came down to the paint."

Williams finished with 31 points for Trinity, including five 3-pointers, and Tyler Bike added nine points, six of which came off 3s.

The game was tied at 7 after one quarter and the lead changed hands six times in the second quarter. Back-to-back 3s by Williams and Bike with under two minutes to play in the half gave the Pioneers a 17-15 lead, but the Warriors scored the final five points of the half to go up 20-17 at the half.

Every time it looked like Winnacunnet was going to pull away in the third quarter, Williams would get Trinity right back into. After the Warriors went up 34-25 late in the third, Williams hit a pair of 3s to cut the lead down to five, and he repeated that on the early run to open the fourth.

"He has led the state in scoring the last two years for a reason," McKenna said of Williams. "We tried to mix up our defenses and just try to keep them on their toes a little bit. We haven’t played them in a couple of years, so we’d never faced (Williams). We had that challenge, you can see him on tape, but to go toe-to-toe with him, he’s a tremendous talent."

Trinity made it a six-point game on two free throws by Mark Nyomeh with 2:14 to play, but with the Pioneers pressing, the Warriors were able to get a couple of quick baskets to extend the lead and advance to the final.

Winnacunnet will be looking for its first title since 1992 on Saturday, and while the game won't be played at the University of New Hampshire - the tournament's traditional host - it will still be close by at Oyster River.

"I was fortunate to play and coach with Jack Ford and he always used to say if you end your season in Durham, you’ve had a heck of a season," McKenna said. "We’re still in Durham."