December 21, 2011 2:00 AM
HAMPTON — With the Winnacunnet High School girls basketball team, it's a case of pick your poison. The Exeter Blue Hawks found out that almost any choice is deadly.
Exeter opted for a packed-in zone to start Tuesday's game. That was like an early holiday present for Avi Morrison. The senior drilled five 3-pointers in the first quarter on her way to 25 points with seven 3-pointers as Winnacunnet romped to the 69-18 win, its 73rd straight in Division I.
"Right away they were playing a zone and when I saw that I knew it was my time," Morrison said.
Winnacunnet is now 3-0, a confident, experienced and talented group. The Warriors will next face one of their toughest challenges of the season when they travel to The Expo in Portland on Monday to play Maine Class A champ Catherine McAuley, a tall, athletic team the Warriors saw just weeks ago in a hotly contested scrimmage.
"It's definitely going to show us where we're at and at the beginning of the season we weren't working well together yet," Morrison said. "Yeah, it is pretty important. We treat every game the same, take every game one at a time and everything counts."
Warrior point guard Kirsten O'Neil started the 22-2 first-quarter onslaught with a trey about 10 seconds into the game from the top of the key, with no Blue Hawk within six feet of her. Morrison nailed the first one she took moments later.
In one quarter Morrison was 5-of-10 from beyond the arc, scoring 15 points. Not one was a poor shot selection.
Exeter head coach Terry Kukesh knew all about Winnacunnet's ability to shoot from long range.
"But they're also quicker than us and I was concerned what they would do if we played man-to-man," she said. "Basically, we didn't rotate quickly enough out of the zone."
It took Exeter (0-4) over 31 minutes to top Morrison's first-quarter output. No Blue Hawk scored more than four points.
Mimi MacLeod showed the Warriors do have an inside game, scoring 16 points — eight coming in the second quarter. O'Neil finished with 10 points.
In its three games, Winnacunnet is averaging 75.3 points, with an average winning margin of 46.
"We've got to do a little better job with our defensive rebounding right now," Warrior head coach Ed Beattie said. "When the scores are lopsided it's kind of hard to ...; do it but you don't want to get into bad habits. The rest of it is pretty positive right now. Maybe make a few more of our layups."
Beattie had a point. Exeter did have multiple second and third-chance opportunities, and once missed five shots in a single possession — "It's not for a lack of effort," Kukesh noted.
Also, Winnacunnet, which went 9-of-19 on 3-pointers, shot a rather pedestrian (by its standards) 35.4 percent from inside the arc (17 of 48).
All of which means the Warriors can continue to improve. Now that would be deadly.
Winnacunnet 69, Exeter 18
EXETER (18)
Love 0-0-0, Siegal 0-0-0, Graham 1-2-4, Congdon 0-0-0, Brock 0-1-1, Connor 0-0-0, Leavitt 0-0-0, Grijalva 0-0-0, Day 1-1-3, Pollet 2-0-4, Dullea 2-0-4, McQuate 1-0-2. Totals: 7-4-18.
WINNACUNNET (69)
O'Neil 4-0-10, Sullivan 2-1-5, MacLeod 6-4-16, O'Connor 1-1-3, Morrison 9-0-25. Lewis 0-0-0, Galvin 1-0-2, Mutch 1-0-2, Withee 2-0-4, Gould 0-2-2. Totals: 26-8-69.
Exeter 2 5 6 5 —18
Winnacunnet 22 14 13 20—69
3-pointers—Winnacunnet 9: Morrison 7, O'Neil 2. Fouled out—none.
