By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
On X @GDsullysays
When you think about traditional girls basketball powers in the Cape-Atlantic League, teams such as Middle Township, Mainland Regional, Wildwood Catholic, Ocean City and Holy Spirit come to mind.
But Hammonton?
Don’t look now, but the Blue Devils — normally more known for success in sports like field hockey and softball — are the only remaining undefeated team in the league, and one of just two undefeated teams in all of South Jersey along with Paul VI (12-0).
Hammonton has been building under coach Ryan Staiger, who’s in his third season, and the Devils are following up 18-9 mark with a perfect 13-0 start. The Blue Devils are playing with a strange combination of confidence and trepidation — like, yeah, we know we have some talent, but how the heck are we 13-0?
“It’s been a lot of fun. Nobody really thought this. We knew we were going to be a good team — we really did, coming in. We had a great summer, a great offseason, but 13-0? At Hammonton?” Staiger said following Hammonton’s thrilling 51-48, overtime win over Atlantic City. “We were not imagining being 13-0. We’re trying to figure out if this is the best start Hammonton has ever had. And I’m like, ‘girls, let’s focus, one game at a time.’”
They’ve had every kind of win you can think of: blowout wins in their own holiday tournament, a comfortable 18-point victory against Vineland, and scratching out 1- and 3-point wins over Ocean City and Atlantic City, respectively.
“We knew that with Ocean City and Atlantic City (last week) that we had to lock in. Games like that are what make basketball fun to play. Those teams are going to give us our best shot no matter what — even if we are 13-0, it doesn’t matter,” Staiger said. “But the best part is, everybody is going to give us their ‘A’ game. I was telling the girls, the way EHT played last year, always locked in, that’s how teams are going to attack us. Everybody wants to be the first team that beats us.”
The girls are certainly enjoying this run to start the season, but at the same time, they don’t necessarily know how to handle what is now a true streak that builds pressure with every win. Hammonton has 10 games in the next three weeks, so at this point anything can happen.
“A lot of the girls, including myself, think it’s very scary because now everyone is out to get us. Everyone wants to be the team that beats the undefeated team, so it’s scary going into each game knowing that,” said senior forward Sarah Griffiths. “We just keep going, though. We like to flex, like, ‘oh, we’re 13-0.’ But in reality it’s like, ‘uh-oh, we’re 13-0, this is kind of scary because we’ve never actually done this before.’ It’s good, though, we’re staying locked in at practice every day. We have days where we’re doing some team bonding, but most of the days we’re fully locked in and keeping each other up.”
Staiger said his message to the girls at this time of the season is not necessarily about keeping the winning streak alive, but all those goals the girls wrote down during the hot summer months? Yeah, those can become a reality if his players continue to buy in, keep playing team basketball and keep believing they are a good team that can win postseason games. Hammonton has balanced scoring with four players having scored more than 100 points, and as a team the Blue Devils play outstanding defense, as evidenced by their 132 blocked shots and 248 steals. They are forcing more than 20 turnovers per game by their opponents. That’s a good recipe to have when you’re trying to win games in the Cape-Atlantic League and South Jersey Group 3 tournaments in February.
“It’s nice to have team goals in the sense of having a lot of wins and winning the division for the first time in about eight years, but at the same time, we’ve never won a CAL playoff game. We can make a run in the CAL and we can make a run in South Jersey Group 3. (The sectional tournament) is going to be a lot deeper than we thought it would be at the beginning of the year, but I think we have a good team. They are playing with confidence, they’re trusting each other and they all want to make that extra pass. The sky is the limit to what we can do, we just have to play with confidence,” Staiger said. “We’re not just here to win a division. We have goals we want to achieve. We have big goals that we want to make sure we accomplish. When we were at team camp over the summer, we listed everything we wanted — we wanted to win the division, make a run in the CAL Tournament and make a run in Group 3. I want the girls to understand that we can do this.”
WHAT’S NEXT: Hammonton beat Millville today, 58-18, to run its win streak to 14 straight games. The Blue Devils next host Lower Cape May on Thursday at 5:30 p.m.
