DRIVE TIME: Hun School girls’ basketball player Gabby D’Agostino heads to the hoop in a game last winter. Last Wednesday, junior guard D’Agostino tallied 12 points to help Hun defeat the Academy of New Church (Pa.) 67-31. The Raiders, who defeated the Mercersburg Academy (Pa.) 75-58 last Sunday in the Hill School (Pa.) Girls’ Basketball Tournament to improve to 7-1, play at the Perkiomen School (Pa.) on December 11 before competing in the She Got Game Classic at The St. James in Springfield, Va., from December 13-15 and then hosting Tower Hill (Del.) on December 17. (Photo by Frank Wojciechowski)

By Bill Alden

Gabby D’Agostino carried the scoring load for the Hun School girls’ basketball team last winter as a sophomore.

The sharpshooting guard tallied 370 points in 15 games during her debut campaign with the program, more than the team’s next two top scorers combined.

But with Hun adding some talented newcomers this season, there is less pressure on D’Agostino to pile up the points.

“We have so many new people this year, we move the ball so well,” said D’Agostino. “When someone is playing bad, we have people on the bench who will step up and come in. We have full trust in everybody that starts the game on the bench. The starting lineup switches every game.”

Last Wednesday against Academy of New Church (Pa.), Hun displayed that balance as seven different players scored in the first quarter to help Hun build a 24-7 lead.

“We knew we had to start out hot because we have five games this week,” said D’Agostino. “It was making sure that we have the momentum to get into there. We were energy to start, defense led to our offense.”

With Hun up 34-17 heading into the second half, the Raiders put the game out of reach as they outscored ANC 20-6 in the third quarter on the way to a 67-31 win.

“We wanted to increase the lead a little bit,” said D’Agostino, who ended up 12 points in the victory. “They were playing a zone so it was move the ball around and get the best shot possible.”

D’Agostino is happy to be on the move again as her 2023-24 season was cut short by appendicitis.

“I couldn’t do anything for a week plus it was leading up to AAU season,” said D’Agostino. “It was kind of hard to get the flow back, the competitive nature back.”

To get back in the flow, D’Agostino put in some extra work over the summer.

“I worked on everything, threes, floaters, and lay-ups, just trying to get back in the swing,” said D’Agostino. “I was practicing a little longer and lifting a little harder just to catch up with everyone else.”

With Hun improving to 7-1 after defeating the Mercersburg Academy (Pa.) 75-58 last Sunday in the Hill School (Pa.) Girls’ Basketball Tournament, D’Agostino sees selfless play as a key to its early success.

“I would say ball movement for sure, everyone is so unselfish,” said D’Agostino. “If you have a good shot, pass it up for a great shot. Defense leads to offense and easy transition points. If you play hard on defense you kind of relax on offense.”

Having less scoring responsibility, D’Agostino has focused on facilitating things.

“It is definitely playmaking,” said D’Agostino in describing her role. “When I am driving if they are double-teaming, I can kick it out and I have full trust that they are going to make the shot.”

D’Agostino has bonded with the team’s three freshmen. Sienna Golizio, Meso Nwobu, and Jayla Williams.

“It is really easy on this team to make friendships,” said D’Agostino. “The freshmen are so developed. My freshman year, I don’t think I was as good as any of them. We switch up the backcourt every time. It can be me and Meso, me and Sienna and me and Addi [McNally].”

Hun head coach Sean Costello has been mixing and matching to find which combinations work best.

“We have been experimenting with a lot of lineups,” said Costello. “That was a completely different group of kids starting the game than we have had. The whole thing is we are just seeing what we have got. We played yesterday and I said the starters today are not going to start tomorrow. We are going to mix it up and see what we have got.”

In the win over ANC, Costello liked the way his squad turned up the defensive heat in the second half.

“Team defense is something we are working on in general,” said Costello. “I said, ‘We are sitting back a little bit, there were some passing lanes that we could jump.’ We know we can score off of pressure in transition, but we are working on some other stuff.”

While Costello is happy to see D’Agostino focusing on playmaking this season, he wants her to still look for her shot.

“As long as she doesn’t stop trying to score,” said Costello. “She played great today, she is an unbelievable passer. It is something that she hasn’t really had the opportunity to do a lot. I think the challenge will be for her to find that balance this year, making sure that she is still being aggressive and that alpha scorer but then at the same time distributing and getting other people shots.”

The addition of freshmen Golizio, Nwobu, and Willams has given Hun more offensive balance.

“They are great, they all play a little bit of a different game,” said Costello. “They complement one another well, they fit in really well. They are good kids.”

The pair of seniors, CeeJay Thomas and Amira Pinkett, gives Hun a strong inside game to go with the perimeter play. “CeeJay is a good interior player,” said Costello. “Amira defends on the interior a lot, she can actually shoot the ball really well. We have a lot of different ways we can play, we can go big, we can go small. We can get some shooting on the floor. It is an interesting team. We have a lot of different pieces that we are trying to figure out.”

As the Raiders experiment with different lineups, Costello wants to see gritty play from his squad.

“I just tell them get better each game; we are going to learn a little bit more about our team and figure out where we go,” said Costello, whose team plays at the Perkiomen School (Pa.) on December 11 before competing in the She Got Game Classic at The St. James in Springfield, Va. from December 13-15 and then hosting Tower Hill (Del.) on December 1. “For us, it is not just if we are making shots we are doing well; we are going to score. We have some kids who are talented but we need to defend and rebound.”

Costello is encouraged by how his players have blended their talents.

“The thing I am most happy about is the teamwork,” said Costello. “They share the ball really well, they enjoy other people’s success. This is something we are really focused on, knowing that we have some depth. It might not be your day, it might be somebody else’s day and that is good for us.”

D’Agostino, for her part, believes that sharing the wealth has become the squad’s calling card.

“I think it is just calming everything down, being unselfish,” said D’Agostino. “We don’t care who plays well if we play well as a team.”