By DAVE O’SULLIVAN Publisher EGG HARBOR CITY — Players on the Cedar Creek High School girls basketball team know that St. Joseph’s Dana DiRenzo is one of the best players in the Cape-Atlantic League. Still, they’d rather have Casey Thomas on their side any day. The 6-foot senior scored a game-high 15 points to lead the Pirates to a 41-30 win over the visiting Wildcats on Friday night that helped Cedar Creek capture its third consecutive CAL United Conference championship. “It gets us all excited when we see Casey do what she does because we know hard she works in practice to be better. She’s a game-changer,” said fellow senior Shannon Fletcher. “Casey is an awesome player,” added Maddy Tomasello. “Once she gets fired up, as a team we feel that intensity and we know we have to get it done. Casey is a huge part of our team. Once she gets going, she gets us all pumped up.” Cedar Creek's Alissa Reeves puts up a shot against St. Joseph defender Dana DiRenzo. Cedar Creek’s Alissa Reeves puts up a shot against St. Joseph defender Dana DiRenzo. “It’s a great feeling, especially because we graduated so many people last year. It was really important that we could prove to ourselves that we could win it again. I think it says we have the heart to come out here and prove it to ourselves, and that we still have it in us and we can come out here and win,” Thomas said. “We definitely all feed off each other, and that’s great. We have that type of chemistry that when one of us gets hot, we all get hot.” “It’s exciting because I think there was a lot of doubts against us,” Fletcher said. “We’ve seen so much talent pass through this school the last few years, and it’s exciting to carry that on.” “Once we all stepped on the court it was ‘go big or go home.’ We wanted to make it count,” Tomaselli said. “This program has set so many records and we’re trying to keep that up, so I think it was a great night for us.” With the conference title wrapped up, the Pirates soon will be turning their attention the Cape-Atlantic League and state tournaments later this month and into early March. “We finally gelled together. We went through a couple of rough games, but it was awesome to have that feeling,” Tomaselli said. “We are understanding the game more, like if the ball goes down to Casey and the defense crashes down, the opposite side is wide open for the jump shot. We’re looking to drive, make our foul shots. We’re really playing as a team.” “I think our focus is just taking everything one step at a time. I think at the beginning of the season we were all like, ‘we want to do this, we want to do that,’ but now that we are actually doing it and taking it game by game, that gives us a chance to take a step back and say, ‘wow, this is really within reach for us,'” Fletcher said. “We have to learn from our mistakes, and it’s crunch time of the season. This is the time not to make mistakes.” Contact Dave O’Sullivan: sully@acglorydays.com; on Twitter @GDsullysays Check out facebook.com/acglorydays for a photo gallery from this game [adsense]