Jan 12, 2008 — If any local rival was ever going to give the York Catholic girls a tussle on the hardwood, it was going to be Delone Catholic.

The combined winners of the last five Class AA girls' state titles know each other quite well.

That familiarity led to competitive basketball for a half Friday night when the Squirettes invaded York Catholic, looking to put an end to the Irish girls' epic winning streak - which seems to reach another milestone with every victory.

But Delone could not sustain it, and the Irish pulled away after halftime of a 42-29 triumph.

The victory extended York Catholic's winning streak to 61 games - tying the Irish with the Allentown boys' team of 1944-47 for the third-longest known streak on record in Pennsylvania.

The Irish have a short turnaround and huge test today when they travel to Shiremanstown to face Trinity at 2:30 p.m. in search of No.62.

Friday, York Catholic (17-0, 8-0 Division II) held Delone (9-6, 6-2) to six second-half points, clamping down defensively while using an 11-2 third-quarter run to run up a double-digit advantage.

Suddenly it was 35-25 through 24 minutes, and the legitimate threat at halftime was no more.

"Well, Gerry (Eckenrode) is a great coach, and he had a great game plan," York Catholic head coach Kevin Bankos said of his Delone counterpart. "I told our girls to be patient, be patient.

"They definitely outplayed us in the first half, and they were playing hard. I know

(Gerry's) a little frustrated right now, but you play hard and good things are going to happen."

The Squirettes had Jen Scherer but precious little else offensively.

"(Scherer) and (Meagan Raville) were our two big concerns," Bankos said. "As a coach, you aim to shut those two kids down, and hope the other three don't beat you."

Scherer carried Delone in the first half, when the Squirettes closed with a 7-2 run to cut it to a single point, 24-23, heading into the locker room.

Unfortunately, Scherer also carried the Squirettes after the break, scoring all six of her team's points.

"Two words: Can't score," Eckenrode said. "I'll credit their team for a great defensive effort, and Kevin does a great job with those girls. But a lot of times we are just inept during the course of a ball game.

"These kids try. They play as hard as any team I've ever had here. But sometimes we are just inept. It's frustrating to me, and frustrating to them."

Catholic guard Ashton Bankos said the Irish knew they could play better than they had showed, and talked about it at halftime.

"We knew we had to come out and go in the second half, because they (Delone) knew they could play with us," she said. "We came out hard and didn't hold anything back."

The battle of the Catholics opened as barnburner, with both squads shooting the lights out in the first quarter and combining for 28 points (15-13 Irish).

But the game's pace slowed dramatically when Delone starting misfiring on the few clean looks it was able to manufacture against Catholic's press defense.

Complicating the effort was Delone's inability to box out. The Squirettes gave up several offensive rebounds, struggling to match up effectively with Irish forwards Brittany Hicks and Kelly Rhein under the glass at both ends.

Five of Hicks' nine point were generated off second-chance rebounds.

Kady Schrann and Jenny McGann each had 10 points to pace York Catholic.

Scherer's 16 points led all scorers and were more than half her team's total for the game.