Seneca’s pressure defense, offensive execution too much for Serena

SERENA – Serena hung around early, but Seneca used pressure defense and ran its offense to near perfection as the Irish cruised to a 66-33 nonconference victory over the host Huskers Saturday night in Serena.

Seneca is used to seeing teams try different things to stop guard Paxton Giertz, but Saturday the Irish were in sync with each other on the offensive end.

The Irish moved the ball well to start the game as they got the ball into the paint to Brady Sheedy for the bucket and moments later drove the lane and finished with the layup for the 8-3 lead.

Serena’s Payton Twait hit the bank shot, but Seneca immediately responded with a fast break layup from Cameron Shirley and then a 3-pointer from Giertz as the lead grew to 19-11 after the first quarter of action.

Seneca continued to force the Huskers into turnovers which led to another fast break layup from Grant Siegel and then another from James Zydron as the lead grew to 26-14.

Blake Hjerpe converted a fast break layup of his own and then picked up a loose ball and got the ball to drop, but the Irish got a 3-pointer to fall from Sheedy as Seneca led 44-25 at the break.

“Teams have tried to come up with gimmick defenses all year to stop Giertz,” Seneca coach Russell Witte said. “But I thought tonight was the first night where other players didn’t freeze up. This game was about cutting to the basket and finishing which is something we struggled a bit with before, but not tonight. The kids stepped up and played well.”

On the other end of the court Serena coach Dain Twait took the responsibility of how they wanted to defend the Irish start guard.

“Yeah how we were on defense was definitely on me,” Twait said. “We tried to run some different things at Giertz. The kid is a stud and tonight when we did that it left some things open and Seneca took advantage of it and when you try to take away something you are going to leave something open as well and Seneca found it all night. There’s a reason they’re the top seed in the Christmas tournament and probably the best team in the area.”

As good as the Irish defense was in the first half they turned up the pressure even more in the second half only allowing eight points in the entire half.

Giertz started things off with a steal and the layup and then Sheedy forced the turnover that led to the bucket and the foul for the 3-point play.

Giertz made it 56-25 with a 3-pointer from deep and then finally with 2:19 remaining in the third Hjerpe got the floater to fall for the first Huskers points of the quarter.

However the Irish responded right away with a 3-pointer from Giertz that gave Seneca a 64-29 lead heading into the fourth where they finished with a 66-33 victory.

“I was happy with our shot selection tonight,” Witte said. “Paxton (Giertz) didn’t force anything. He let the game come to him. It was a good all around game for us.”

“We just couldn’t get into any offense tonight,” Twait said. “Seneca took everything away from us. The way they can trap and pressure and their athleticism really bothered us and their physicality as well. Then on offense they just distributed the ball well and getting into the lane makes things that much more difficult to defend.”

For the game Giertz led all scorers with 18 while Sigel added 17 and Sheedy with 11 while Serena was led by Hjerde with 11.