What a difference a year makes. Bellport girls basketball entered the 2023-24 season with seven total wins in the four years prior and now, the wait for a reborn Clippers program is over.
The weight of triumph began to flow as No. 5 Bellport took down host No. 4 Comsewogue, 51-39, Friday in the Suffolk Class AA quarterfinals. Coach Rynese Smith, who graduated from Bellport in 2011 and took over the team in 2022, wiped away tears after the game not long after the road crowd spelled out and chanted, “Bellport,” in the game’s final minutes.
“The girls put in the work every day, they show up for me, they show up for each other,” Smith said. “I get crazy, and they accept it. They push it. And it got us here.”
A pair of three-pointers by freshman forward Rosie Micucci plus one more from senior Kaylee Graham — her first basket of the game — helped the Clippers take a 10-point lead with under two minutes to play. Micucci finished with a game-high 17 points, five steals and nine rebounds as Bellport outscored Comsewogue 19-6 in the fourth quarter.
“We go hard in practice, and it just pays off in the games,” said Micucci, who first joined the team as a seventh-grader. “ . . . It was awesome to see the (support from the crowd). All the people in the stands definitely played a role in getting us amped up.”
Seniors Autumn Simon and Brynn Johnsen were equally instrumental to the win. Simon had 15 points, seven rebounds and three blocks while being a persistent thorn in Comsewogue’s side. Her dominance in the paint opened up Bellport to hit the crucial three-pointers late after going three quarters without a single one. She also connected on all seven of her free-throw attempts.
Johnsen was like a lightning bolt, jumping in front of passes to record steals while being disruptive the whole game, particularly on fast breaks. The guard finished with 14 points and five steals as the Clippers scored 19 times on its 29 free-throw attempts. Comsewogue only…
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