Opening Night did not go as planned at Vaughn Stapleton Gymnasium.
Now in his fourth season in charge of the Bridgewater-Raritan High School girls’ basketball team, Xavier Brooks realized something after the Panthers fell by 26 points at home to rival Pingry School, which also pitched a shutout in the second quarter.
Bridgewater-Raritan has dogs on its squad.
“We started off the week – weak, realistically,” Brooks said of that result. “Pingry was a great team, but they were just more skilled than us at the end of the day. I said to our girls that it is not about wins and losses, but about how we play. Whatever the outcome is, I will deal with it as long as we play the right way.”
“We decided to change things up and go full-court pressure.”
With back-to-back road games on their schedule to round out their first week of the 2025-26 season, that immediate flip of the switch proved to pay dividends early in the season for Bridgewater-Raritan.
When they returned home from Allentown High School just four days after their crushing home loss to Pingry, suddenly, the Panthers made Opening Night feel like a distant memory.
Bridgewater-Raritan (2-1) and Allentown (1-2) combined for just three points in the first six and a half minutes of regulation, but starting with a bucket by sophomore guard Sam Tremarco (six points) and a call to their bullpen, the Panthers erupted for 14 consecutive points while allowing just one field goal in 19 first-half shots by the Redbirds. Leading by 15 points at halftime, Bridgewater-Raritan tallied 17 points from its bench and locked down Allentown, which was held to just under 10% shooting from the floor and an 0-for-15 mark from downtown.
While the Panthers were engaged in a low-scoring affair, nine of their players scored in an impressive 40-18 victory for Bridgewater-Raritan Saturday, December 20, in Allentown.
“I’m just proud of our team effort across the board,” praised after the game by Brooks, whose team has now allowed an average of just 27 points in its past two victories since falling 51-25 to Pingry School on Tuesday evening. “We’re playing 10 girls, which is really hard on us. It makes it better for us coaches since we can just rotate whoever we want to rotate based on the vibes and energy that we need. We had a couple of lulls, but we made the subs of our forwards and a couple of our guards.”
“From that point, we made a huge jump.”
Although Bridgewater-Raritan missed its first four shots, its defense responded by forcing three missed shots by the Redbirds before junior forward Maddy Corbitt (three points) opened the game’s scoring with 4:12 left in the first period. A split pair of free throws by junior guard/forward Madison Sullivan (six points, 10 rebounds) just under a minute later drew Allentown to 2-1, but neither team scored for the next two minutes.
Tremarco’s aforementioned basket with 1:28 remaining in the period then jump started Bridgewater-Raritan, but junior forward Sophia Kaschak (six points) fired in a corner triple shortly after being the first player off of the Panthers’ bench. Her momentum-swinging shot in the final 20 seconds of the first period extended the Panthers’ lead to 7-1 to close out a low-scoring first quarter.
That said, a six-point deficit against Bridgewater-Raritan’s defense proved to be too tall of a task for Allentown to overcome.
“Coming in and hitting a big shot like that really boosts our energy and allows us to keep the game going,” said after the game by Kaschak, who is also known as ‘Cash Money’ amongst her Bridgewater-Raritan squad.
“We really work hard in practice to make sure we lock down our defenders and make sure we’re on the help side, too.”
Further elevating that energy in the second quarter next off of the Panthers’ bench was sophomore forward Sarah Hurlbut (three points), who grabbed two of her three rebounds in that period alone and was instrumental amongst Bridgewater-Raritan’s lockdown defense. The Chase in nearby Robbinsville may have been closed, but the bank was open in the Redbirds’ gymnasium on Saturday morning, when Kaschak’s second three-pointer with 6:34 remaining in the second quarter then gave the Panthers another spark out of the first-quarter intermission.
“She is a great shooter for us,” praised Brooks of Kaschak. “We knew today against the 3-2 zone that those corners were going to be open all day. Her first two threes were banged out in the corners, and that was awesome. Having her back this game made it even easier to spread out the floor and put pressure on the defense, because [Allentown] knew they had to rotate. When ‘Cash’ hit those two shots, they now allowed us to drive and get a little more action on the opposite side, which got our forwards involved, too.”
“[Sophomore forward Safaa Fakhry] also was able to own the block and get a couple of shots up, but everybody got something today.”
While sophomore guard Erin Brocklehurst (six points) then was the third player off of the Panthers’ bench, she quickly tallied a steal before sinking back-to-back three pointers to extend Bridgewater-Raritan’s lead to 16-1 and force a timeout with 3:31 left in the second quarter.
In that period, Brocklehurst also snagged one rebound each on the offensive and defensive ends of the court.
Junior Lily DeRose (four points, three rebounds, three steals) then connected on Allentown’s first field goal of the game with 2:08 left in the second quarter before splitting a pair of free throws in the final 30 seconds of the period to round out the Redbirds’ first-half scoring.
In between, Hurlbut also split a pair of free throws for Bridgewater-Raritan, which held Allentown to just four-for-41 (9.8%) shooting overall from the floor.
Senior guard Bri Cacchio (seven points) collected her first field goal with 1:04 left in the second quarter to give her team a 19-4 lead, which factored in a whopping six different point scorers at halftime.
“We know that Corbitt and Sarah are great energy players,” Brooks said of the aforementioned two forwards, who started and came off of the bench, respectively. “Corbitt does a good job being a vocal leader to start off the games, but Sarah comes in and keeps the energy going from that point.”
“We love having that rotation between Sarah and Corbitt.”
Allentown posted its best offensive quarter of the day after halftime, when the Redbirds scored seven of their 10 third-quarter points from the free-throw line and put themselves into the bonus due to drawing contact from the Panthers. While Allentown posted 10 steals from its defense, which has now allowed an average of just 39.3 points per game through its first three games, Bridgewater-Raritan responded by allowing just two more field goals in the third quarter and one more in the fourth quarter.
Bridgewater-Raritan shot 14-for-37 (38%) from the floor, which factored in seven made shots each in the first and second halves. Its most efficient stretch came in the second and third quarters, when the Panthers combined for an eight-for-17 (47%) mark, including a pair of successful shots by Tremarco from short range and then by Cacchio from downtown during the second minute of the third quarter alone.
In between, Hurlbut, Corbitt, and Fakhry: the Panthers’ other of two starting forwards, continued to leave no doubt on the defensive end on the way to helping Bridgewater-Raritan allow a two-for-12 (17%) mark from the floor in the third quarter.
“On defense, we really just have to focus on keeping our composure and trying to focus on their best players,” said after the game by Fahkry, who also blocked three shots on Saturday morning and grabbed five of her seven rebounds alone in the fourth quarter. “We need to keep them locked down with our defensive rebounding.”
“That’s how we get more points on the offense.”
DeRose and senior guard/forward Makayla Rondinelli (three points, one steal) each tallied double-digit scoring outputs in their first two games for Allentown, which competes in the Valley Division of the Colonial Valley Conference. Both of the Redbirds’ first two games of the 2025-26 season were divisional matchups on the road: a 42-34 loss at Lawrence High School on Tuesday evening followed by a 48-36 victory at Steinert High School on Thursday evening.
Bridgewater-Raritan limited DeRose and Rondinelli to just eight total points on Saturday morning.
“This is definitely going to boost our confidence,” reacted Fakhry to the aforementioned statistic.
“We just need to ride the high on the win, continue to push big, and get better every day.”
Cacchio also swished a pair of free throws en route to a five-point period for the Panthers, while sophomore guard Amanda Ciser (four points) also struck in similar fashion from the charity stripe with 5:48 left in the third period. Two of Bridgewater-Raritan’s baskets then occurred in the final minute of the third quarter, when Tremarco and Hurlbut gave the Panthers four third-period scorers and a 32-14 lead heading into the game’s final eight minutes.
Bridgewater-Raritan stamped its victory by allowing just four points in the fourth quarter, which resulted in eight combined points allowed in the first, second, and fourth periods. While they were both held without a field goal by Allentown’s defense over the game’s first three quarters, Fakhry and Ciser both connected on fourth-quarter baskets to further end the Panthers’ day on a strong note.
Sophomore forward Sydney Albano (two points) then sunk Bridgewater-Raritan’s final field goal with 21 seconds remaining to close out the visitors’ 40-18 victory.
Junior forward Juliet Kohutis also swiped one rebound to put all 10 of the Panthers’ players into the scorebook on either end of the floor.
“We rotate 10 bodies to keep our legs fresh, so if someone goes in, they have to give us our all before we put our next person in,” concluded Brooks of his team, which also opened up Skyland Conference Raritan Division play with a 42-36 victory at Hunterdon Central Regional High School Thursday, December 18, in Flemington. “A lot of teams we play don’t have as deep of a bench, so we’re going to take advantage of that. That was one big switch for us, but then we have just been staying within ourselves with our composure. We have been more composed on the offensive end. Our first game, we only made seven field goals together and had that one quarter of no points, but we’re ripping and running now.”
“We’re playing good defense, letting our defense initiate the offense, and it’s a beautiful thing for us.”
Bridgewater-Raritan (2-1) will next close out the calendar year at Summit High School over holiday recess, when it will play in the four-team Pete Tierney Memorial Holiday Tournament. The Panthers will play two games, including its opening game at 4 p.m. Saturday, December 27, in Summit, before closing out the event at a time to be determined Monday, December 29.
Bridgewater-Raritan will then ring in the New Year by returning to Vaughn Stapleton Gymnasium against Rahway High School at 11:30 a.m. Saturday, January 3, in Bridgewater.