Photo by KEVIN JOHNSON
Kelsey McGregor of Marco leaves the basketball court after her St. John Neumann team fell short in upsetting favored Mayo-Lafayette in the state 2A basketball semifinals.
Photo by KEVIN JOHNSON
St. John Neumann's Kelsey McGregor and Mayo-Lafayette's Kelsey Land, right, vie for a rebound in the second half of Thursday's Class 2A state semifinal.
Photo by KEVIN JOHNSON
Kelsey McGregor of Marco leaves the basketball court after her St. John Neumann team fell short in upsetting favored Mayo-Lafayette in the state 2A basketball semifinals.
When the season started Shannon McFee, the St. John Neumann girls basketball coach, knew he had a special team.
His Lady Celtics didn’t disappoint, taking an incredible ride to the Class 2A state semifinals. The ride ended on Thursday in Lakeland, but not before they put a scare into highly-touted Mayo-Lafayette.
By getting to the semifinals they matched the 1994 girls team as being the only Celtics teams to reach the final four.
“We were down by 18 points in the third quarter and battled back to have a chance to tie at the buzzer,” McFee said.
“Kelsey McGregor (of Marco) had a fantastic year and Sarah Wickham is a special player, but you don’t get to the final four without an outstanding team effort.”
Seniors McGregor and Wickham were team leaders. McGregor on rebounding and defense, Wickham on scoring and defense. Wickham scored more than 2,000 points in her career, topping her coach McFee’s previous record.
“It was an amazing year,” McGregor said. “At the beginning of the year I don’t think anyone expected us to get this far. Winning the district title over Community (School of Naples) gave us momentum. It was good for our confidence, knowing that if we set our minds as a team we could accomplish a lot.”
McGregor said that this year’s team was more like family.
“This was a special team, more than just playing basketball,” she said. “We were more of a family. During year there was death of (a teammate’s) family member and we came together as family would.”
When the end came McGregor had mixed emotions.
“I was happy with what we accomplished the whole year and how well we had done, but there was also disappointment. We wanted to play one more game.”
In the semifinal game, McGregor tallied nine points, with her last basket bringing the Lady Celtics within three points, but that was as close as they would get, losing 52-49.
Lafayette lost in the championship game to North Florida Christian of Tallahassee, 54-44.
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