Hazleton Area prevails; Patriots' Ranieli scores 1,000th career point

Jan. 6—YATESVILLE — Hazleton Area rolled into town and soured the mood on a milestone night, shutting down the Pittston Area offense to the tune of a 65-33 victory on Friday night.

Early in the third quarter, Pittston Area point guard Daniella Ranieli became the 16th player in program history to score 1,000 career points, sinking the second of two free throws to reach the mark.

That was about all the Patriots had to celebrate on Friday, as Hazleton Area jumped on them from the start and never let up.

"Daniella's the MVP of the league, she's a great player," said Hazleton Area head coach Joe Gavio, tipping the cap to the Pittston Area point guard. "I thought the two kids we put on her did a phenomenal job."

The Cougars put the press on early and it led to instant success, creating a number of turnovers and preventing Ranieli and her teammates from finding any rhythm on offense.

Hazleton jumped out to a 20-6 lead after one quarter, and hit the locker room at halftime with a 15-point lead.

At that point, Ranieli had made just one basket — a three-pointer with less than a minute left in the half — a testament to the job Hazleton Area's defenders were doing on taking her out of the equation.

The Cougars used their size advantage on the offensive end to score at the rim, grabbing a lot of offensive rebounds to aid in doing so.

It was a balanced night for Hazleton Area: four Cougars scored in double figures, led by freshman Sophia Benyo with 13. In all, 12 different Hazleton Area players made their way into the scoring column.

"That's what we do ... we have four or five people who could score double figures on any given night, and that helps us tremendously," Gavio said.

It looked, late in the first half and into the third quarter, that Pittston Area might have been starting to solve the Cougars defense, playing pretty even in the second quarter and hanging around in the third.

Ranieli made the team's first basket of the second half and drew a foul driving to the hoop that put her on the free throw line, needing to make both to reach 1,000 points.

She did just that, sending the Patriots crowd into a frenzy and leading to a brief stoppage to honor her achievement.

"I'm thrilled for Daniela, it's a wonderful accomplishment," Pittston Area coach Jeff Gregory said. "She works at this 12 months a year, she puts a ton of time in and I couldn't be happier for her."

The boost of momentum for the Patriots was quickly extinguished, however. A 9-2 Hazleton Area run over the final 2:29 of the third quarter made it a 21-point game, and the Cougars finished with a 16-5 run in the final quarter to close out a lopsided victory on the road.

In addition to Benyo's 13 points, the Cougars had three players right at 10 points: Sophia Shults, Olivia Williams and Alexis Reimold, who scored all 10 of her points in the second half after sitting the first half to rest up an injury.

Ranieli led the Patriots with nine points. Lili Hintze added seven points and Maddie Karp chipped in six for Pittston Area.

Hazleton Area 65, Pittston Area 33

HAZLETON AREA (65) — Williams 3 2-2 10, Benyo 6 1-2 13, Lagowy 1 1-2 3, S. Shults 3 4-6 10, Bindas 3 0-0 7, E. Shults 1 0-0 2, Eberts 1 0-0 2, Reimold 4 2-2 10, Marolo 0 0-0 0, Yost 1 0-0 3, Gregory 0 0-0 0, Chupela 0 0-0 0, Radice 0 0-0 0, Rodgers 0 0-0 0, Silva 1 0-0 2, Meyers 0 1-2 1, Forschner 1 0-0 2. Totals 25 11-17 65

PITTSTON AREA (33) — Ranieli 3 2-2 9, Karp 3 0-0 6, Latona 0 3-6 3, Lazevnick 1 0-0 3, Hintze 3 0-0 7, G. Callahan 0 0-0 0, K. Chernouskas 2 0-0 4, N. Callahan 0 0-0 0, Drozginski 0 0-0 0, Roman 0 0-0 0, Lizza 0 1-2 1, Dessoye 0 0-0 0, Schneider 0 0-0 0, Stuccio 0 0-0 0, Long 0 0-0 0, Pointek 0 0-0 0, A. Chernouskas 0 0-0 0. Totals 12 6-8 33

Hazleton Area'20'15'14'16 — 65

Pittston Area'6'14'8'5 — 33

Three-point goals: HAZ 4 (Williams 2, Bindas, Yost), PIT 3 (Ranieli, Lazevnick, Hintze).