OXON HILL, Md. – Former Pittston Area player Leah Hodick and Old Forge’s Lindsey Welsh started throughout the tournament when the JB Hoops Bucci AAU basketball team went 6-1 and won the Platinum Consolation bracket title at the USJN 17U Girls Nationals July 20-23 at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center at National Harbor.
Hodick, a transfer student who is preparing for her senior year at Riverside, and Welsh, going into her fourth year as a starter for the Lady Devils, helped JB Hoops go 27-2 in live events – those used by college coaches for recruiting – this season, finishing first or second each time.
JB Hoops finished second in its pool, allowing it to be among the top one-third of the tournament’s teams that moved from pool play to bracket competition. It joined four other second-place teams in the Platinum Consolation bracket, which it won with two victories Tuesday in the team’s final games together.
Hodick has played with JB Hoops since junior high. Welsh joined the program this year.
The 6-foot Hodick was the team’s most accurate shooter during the tournament, going 18-for-28 (64.3 percent). She also shared the team lead with five blocked shots, averaged 5.3 points per game and hit the winning basket in the bracket final.
JB Hoops and Team Durant, from the Washington, D.C. suburb of Oxon Hill, were tied, 41-41, in the final minute when Hodick took a pass in the lane, pivoted and scored the basket that sent the team on its way to a 45-42 victory.
“I wasn’t really thinking too much about the score and how much time was left,” said Hodick, a Wyoming Valley Conference all-star as a sophomore, who was forced to sit out her junior year after the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association ruled her transfer to have been for athletic intent. “I got the ball. I just turned and laid it in.”
Welsh averaged 3.7 points and came within one of the team lead in both assists with 23 and steals with 12.
After leading the Lady Devils in scoring the last two seasons, Welsh took on a different role with the Scranton-based AAU team, mixing playmaking, tough defense and rebounding from the guard position.
