By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
On X @GDsullysays
GLOUCESTER CITY — There may not be may teams in the upcoming Non-Public B state tournament that fear a 9-12 Gloucester Catholic team — but any potential Rams opponents had better be on guard because this is a team that seems to be coming together at the right time.
A young group that’s now starting a freshman point guard, the Rams have been wildly inconsistent this season. There was a five-game losing streak early in the year followed by a three-game winning streak; then a three-game losing streak followed by the inability of Gloucester Catholic to string together more than one win at a time.
But on Saturday, everything came together as the host Rams used a jaw-dropping 20-0 run to stun rival Gloucester, 51-39. It was Gloucester Catholic’s best win since an epic 98-93 overtime win over Clayton before Christmas — a game in which senior star Jack Mustaro scored 55 points and had 12 rebounds.
He was just as good today, going 10-of-11 from the free-throw line, nailing a couple of threes and scoring a game-high 30 points. The Westville native — and his school’s all-time leading scorer — hit four foul shots in the final minute after Gloucester had cut the deficit down to 44-37 after a flurry of baskets created by pressure defense.
“I was talking to my brother and I said, ‘I needed this one.’ They got me in football a couple times and they got me twice in basketball. But we’re even now,” Mustaro said.
Things didn’t start out so well for the Rams, as the Lions raced out to a 17-6 lead in the first quarter and led by as much as 19-9 early in the second quarter. But then Gloucester Catholic (9-13, 5-4 Tri-County Classic) clamped down on defense, and everything changed. The Rams put premium focus on stopping the Lions’ leading scorer, Keegan Cohan — and they did just that, limiting the dynamic shooter to just eight points — but Cohan’s teammates were making the Rams pay early, until the shooting touch went cold in the second quarter.
“This was fun. I told these guys we can be in playoff games or games against teams ranked in the state but you’re not going to find an environment like this. It doesn’t matter if we’re both good, if one team is good or if we’re both bad, it’s the same thing every time,” said Gloucester Catholic coach Brandon Dougherty (pronounced DOCK-er-ty). “I told our guys that they came out and hit some shots, but they were guys making shots we were playing off of, so we were kind of giving them that. I wanted to see if that would keep happening, I didn’t want us to panic because in some of our early season losses we started to see something like that and we’d be like, ‘OK, where’s a 12-point shot? I have to find that (to make up the deficit.’ So we just stayed the course.
“We got a little lucky in the second quarter because they went cold and that allowed us to execute,” he explained. “I told my guys at halftime that we held them to two points in the second quarter and they started to get some confidence. I told them to go for every loose ball — that if they played like that they’d be sore tomorrow but it would be worth it if they got the win.”
Freshman point guard Gary Connelly nailed a 3-pointer to get the Rams within 19-14, and then senior guard Carlos Mendez had a pair of assists to get his team within 19-18 with two minutes left before halftime. With 40 seconds left before the break, Ethan Dugue hit a short jumper to give Gloucester Catholic the lead for good at 20-19.
“We knew we had to go on a run because we knew they were going to go on a run, theirs just happened to come early. We’ve been harping on defense the past week. We have to be able to play better defense,” Mustaro said. “We lost a couple of tough games (recently) and we knew it was because of our defense. Our offense has been fine, we just needed to be able to lock people down. We’ve been harping on that, and we did that today. We had a great crowd out here and we didn’t want to let them down. We just had to keep our composure and have confidence in our defense.”
That was all part of a 20-0 run that saw the Lions (15-7, 8-1 Colonial Patriot) go more than 10 minutes of game clock without scoring a point. By the time it was over, the Rams led 29-19.
“We’re a really young team and we tend to make our mistakes early on in games. This whole year we haven’t really been able to string a lot of wins together, but (the recent tough losses) I feel like brought us all up to this one game. It built us all the way up,” Mendez said. “I didn’t know (about the 20-0 run). I was just focused on stopping (Cohan). I knew the only way we were going to win this game was to hold him to (close to) a season low. I just wanted to make it my priority to stop whoever was scoring, whoever was their guy.”
“There were times when it felt like the momentum was on our side, but we were just thinking one possession at a time. Get a stop, get a rebound,” Dougherty said. “(Jake Smith/6 points, 7 rebounds) is a really good rebounder and we were worried about him getting rebounds and giving them extra possessions — especially with how much attention we were giving to Cohan. I thought we rebounded really well, and once we were able to settle in on offense we were able to be patient and look for the guy who was open. I told our guys, ‘you’re not going to drive the lane and see it open, you’re going to drive in and see three people. You have to be able to find the open guy.’”
Dougherty had high praise for Mendez, a Camden native, who had nine points but made his presence felt in a big way on the defensive end of the floor.
“I think that was Carlos’ best game of his career. He controlled us, he led the defensive effort and he did a really good job of making sure that Cohan didn’t get a lot of attention,” the coach said. “And Carlos didn’t force things on offense. I think earlier in the year, with us being so young, Carlos and Jack felt like they had to do everything. But now they are trusting the other guys. (Jack) Pund played a good game and he’s bee playing well the last couple of games.”
Today’s win could be a springboard for the Rams, who won 15 games a year ago but were ousted in the sectional semifinals by Bishop Eustace.
“This game is going to help us snowball into the playoffs. It’s good to have this game late (in the season), and especially to win it. That gives us big energy,” Mustaro said. “Holding a team like that to just 39 points, that’s our best defensive game of the year. We’re looking to make a run in the playoffs, and a game like this, against a team that’s been winning a lot of games this year, it’s going to be great for us and our confidence.”
Added Mendez, “I always tell our guys, ‘next game.’ We win here and it’s our biggest win of the season, it’s still, ‘next game.’ I feel bad for the guys last year, we weren’t able to come through (in the state playoffs). This year, me and Jack have to be the ones to lead us through.”
Said coach Dougherty, “I thought we played our best game of the year on Thursday against Pitman but we lost in overtime. It was similar to this game, we had a lead near the end and we had some turnovers, so that’s something we still have to get cleaned up. But I think this might have set the standard for our best game of the year. We struggled early in the season and even in the middle of the season, but they have started to turn the corner. It’s been a little bit of the young guys getting better, but our older guys are making adjustments, too.
WHAT’S NEXT: Gloucester Catholic hosts Salem on Tuesday at 7 p.m. Gloucester travels to Audubon on Tuesday at 7 p.m.
