St. Joseph girls get tough road win at Riverview in battle of playoff teams

By: Michael Love
Thursday, February 8, 2024 | 10:01 PM

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The St. Joseph girls basketball team completed a clean sweep of Section 3-A on Thursday as it went into Riverview’s gym and came away with a 54-32 victory.

“It felt really nice to come into their place and get the win,” said junior guard Gia Richter, who scored 18 points for the Spartans. “We knew they would be tough at home, and we just had to focus on coming out strong and getting an early lead. We did that, and we knew what we needed to do from there to keep the lead.”

The Spartans, who also got 18 points and eight rebounds from senior Julie Spinelli, will conclude their regular season Monday at 5 p.m. at Section 3-3A champion Shady Side Academy.

The game will tip off just three hours after the WPIAL basketball committee is set to release the boys and girls playoff pairings.

“Shady Side is a really good team, and that is going to be a great test for us heading into the playoffs,” St. Joseph coach Geoff Dutelle said. “They can match up with us with guards and post players. They are an unbelievably difficult matchup. It is exactly what you want this time of the year.”

St. Joseph again had the height advantage against a scrappy and determined Riverview team hoping to turn around a 30-point loss to the Spartans from Jan. 15.

The Raiders fell to 14-6 overall and 5-2 in the section. Riverview had at least second place wrapped up coming into the game, and it will look to solidify the runner-up spot Saturday as it is scheduled to host Jeannette (3-4) at 11 a.m.

“We talked about how tough this game was going to be,” Dutelle said. “When we played Riverview at our place, their coach wasn’t there, we got off to an unbelievably hot start, and it was a game where everything went well for us. We said that when we come here, it will be much more difficult. It’s a road environment on their senior night, and they were playing for a piece of the section. We knew they were going to be a much improved team from the first time.

“We needed to come in and kind of embrace the villain role. We fed into it and came out and executed really well. We ran our quick hitters and that kind of settled things down. From there, we had a hard time scoring. Riverview was physical, tough, and they were prepared for us.”

Every St. Joseph starter had at least two points by the 3-minute, 46-second mark of the first quarter. A minute later, the Spartans had built a 19-4 lead.

Riverview trailed 24-8 late in the first before going on a 7-0 run extending to the early part of the second to get the deficit back to nine.

But every time the Raiders made a play on the offensive end, the Spartans had an answer.

Spinelli had 10 in the first quarter and 15 at the half, and Richter recorded 11 points over the first 16 minutes.

St. Joseph was held off the scoreboard for more than four minutes to start the third quarter, but Riverview managed just a single point on a free throw from freshman Juliette Brun.

The Spartans then righted themselves and finished off the third on a 9-0 run — seven points coming from Richter — to lead 47-24 heading to the fourth.

“The girls believed in themselves the whole game, and in that third quarter, we held them,” Riverview coach Jill Catanzaro said. “They exerted a lot of energy, and it seemed like they lost some steam. It also came down to the precision of how we ran our things.”

Layups from junior Katerina Tsambis and senior Lola Abraham early in the fourth cut the lead to 47-28, but Spinelli then sank one of her four 3-pointers to get the momentum back on St Joseph’s side.

“The girls played with heart right down to the last second,” Catanzaro said. “They gave everything they had. We had freshmen grabbing rebounds and blocking shots and making plays. Everyone has a role, and the message was for everyone to accept their role and do it to the best of their ability.”

Senior 6-foot-3 center Anna Kreinbrook scored six points and added 13 rebounds and three blocks for the Spartans.

Raiders sophomore guard Isabel Chaparro came off the bench to hit a pair of 3-pointers in the second quarter, and she finished with eight rebounds. Tsambis led the way with 10 points, and Abraham finished with nine.

“The girls remembered the game in this gym last year vividly,” Dutelle said. “When I got the job, the game here was one of the first ones I flipped on. They are right there. They are a talented team, and we knew what we had to do to make sure we didn’t split the section title with them.”

Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.

Tags: Riverview, St. Joseph