Porters dribble past Tuckers in league opener

There’s a big difference between last year’s and this season’s Greenport/Southold girls basketball team.

The squad still revolves around Francesca Santacroce, but this season, she has more than a little help from her friends.

The senior guard paced the Porters with 17 points en route to a 47-32 home win over rival Mattituck in the team’s Suffolk County League VII opener on Tuesday night.

This season, however, Santacroce has some additional assistance. Eighth-grade guard Lyla Zablotny chipped in with 12 points and junior guard Emily Manwaring added eight points.

“It’s so important,” Santacroce said. “At the beginning of this year, coach Ev [Corwin] said, ‘I want our stat sheet to look like 10 10, 5, 15, I don’t want it to be 20, 2 and 2. We’ve all been playing very well together. We’ve got a young team, but we’re playing great. It’s great when everyone contributes, because then it’s a team win.”

On Dec. 2, Santacroce scored 30 points as the Class B squad rolled to a 55-36 road victory against Miller Place, a Class A team. That was an impressive result, but that won’t help the Porters reach the playoffs because only their record against Class B sides will count.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do still, but I’m just happy with the win because we had a rough year last year,” Corwin said. “It was big for us to get this first league win in our first game. So, whether it was Mattituck or whoever, we needed to win.”

It certainly didn’t hurt that it was against the Tuckers (0-7, 0-2).

“It definitely feels good,” Manwaring said with a big smile. “It’s also weird, because they’re our friends. We’re going to play with them next season for lacrosse.”

In the spring, the three schools combine to form one lacrosse team, the county’s defending Class D champions.

Right now, Manwaring and her teammates are focused on what transpires on the basketball court.

She helped the Porters (2-2, 1-0) get out of the gate, scoring six points, including a trey, for a 10-0 lead, four minutes and 28 seconds after the opening tipoff.

Greenport held a 12-3 first-quarter advantage and enjoyed an 18-4 lead on Santacroce’s first points, on a layup 2:29 into the second period. The Tuckers did not sink their first field goal until senior guard Claire McKenzie, who tallied a team-high 16 points, converted a rebound with 2:58 in the half.

Behind a 9-0 tear, Mattituck pulled within 28-27 with 2:10 left in the third quarter as junior Laurel Richards scored five points and McKenzie added four. The Porters, however, went on a 19-5 surge to close out the game.

“We steadied the ship, but Mattituck’s not going to go away against us. They’re not giving up,” Corwin said. “It was good for us, because last year we lost that game. Once that lead dwindles down to one, we would have lost that game.”

Corwin has been impressed with Zablotny’s performance in her first varsity season. She is averaging 9.3 points a game.

“I’m really encouraged,” he said. “As the year goes on, it’s going to be my job to get, actually get her the ball in certain positions that she could do a little more offensively, because I think she’s got that type of ability. It takes the load off of some of the juniors. As an eighth-grader, to start her career like this is pretty special.”

While the Tuckers remained winless, Mattituck head coach Steve Van Dood was encouraged by the way they battled back from the huge deficit.

“Not only was it vital to the game, it was vital to our season,” he said. “We haven’t had a win yet. The fact that the girls were in the battle, coming from down so much. It means a lot to us. There’s victories, and then there’s victories. In this case, our girls showed that they could run with this team. We played well in their gym, and the girls were able to show that they could play a little bit tougher. We’re working on things to get better. This was a step in the right direction.”

Santacroce felt the same way for Greenport.

“It’s still very early,” she said. “We want to keep this momentum going. We don’t want to peak in the beginning. We want to keep getting better and better. I’m really excited to see how far we can take this team.”