Hot Morningside Finish Burns Notre Dame in 4th Quarter

Notre Dame High’s solid performance against top-seeded Morningside gave way to cold shooting in the game’s final minutes, allowing the Monarchs to escape with a 65-54 victory in a Southern Section III-A Division semifinal basketball game at Inglewood High.

Morningside (27-3) led, 42-40, after three quarters, but G. C. Marcaccini’s 15-foot shot tied the score, 42-42, to start the fourth.

Minutes later Marcaccini hit another basket to keep the Knights (23-5) close at 46-45, but that would mark Notre Dame’s last shot against the talented Monarchs.

Morningside went ahead, 49-45, on three free throws but Notre Dame’s Monte Marcaccini hit a 10-foot jump shot to close the gap to 49-47 with 4:38 left. Then the Knights’ shooting went stone cold--Notre Dame didn’t score for more than three minutes.

In that time, the Monarchs went on a 8-0 run that gave them a 57-47 advantage with 1:32 left.

Notre Dame, which trailed, 31-29, at halftime, enjoyed leads of eight points in the first quarter and 10 points in the second after runs of 9-0 and 8-0, respectively.

But the Knights’ early celebrations proved premature. Notre Dame, which shot 46% (11 of 24) from the field in the first half, shot just 26% (five of 19) in the fourth quarter. Morningside shot 54% in the final eight minutes.

“We had to execute and we didn’t,” Notre Dame Coach Mick Cady said. “We just broke down in that final three-minute period.”

G.C. Marcaccini, who finished with 20 points, had five of his shot attempts batted away near the rim. Four of those blocks were made by Arthur Savage, a 6-foot-6 senior forward.

Savage finished with a game-high 21 points and Dwight Curry added 16 off the bench. Sophomore Stais Boseman, the team’s leading scorer with 19-point average, scored 13 points.