By Jim Dresbach
POTOMAC, MD - Stone Ridge Gator girls basketball coach Amy Heinzelmann mentioned that fans think her squad looks cute and tiny during pre-game warm-ups. Friday night against the Bullis Bulldogs, the Gators played bold and large. Fueled by a 20-point first quarter which featured Matti Vagnoni's three-point shooting, Stone Ridge took advantage of Bullis front court foul trouble to put a 52-39 victory in the 2010-2011 win column.

Bullis' freshman phenom, Lynee' Belton, spent the majority of the first half on the Bulldog bench after being whistled for two opening quarter fouls, and Vagnoni converted three long -range field goals during the first eight minutes of play as the visitors enjoyed a 20-8 lead at the quarter break.

"Anytime you get the little gift of getting someone in foul trouble and on the bench early (you take it), but the big thing when (Belton) was on the court, was to keep her in check, and we did a great job of working together to never give her many one-on-one looks," Heinzelmann said after her squad improved to 13-3 on the season.

Two minutes into the physically-played ISL conference contest, senior shooting guard Vagnoni canned back-to-back three pointers to give the Gators a 7-2 lead, and four minutes later, Alex Zimmerman padded the Stone Ridge lead with her own successful three-pointer to make the score 20-6. Vagnoni shot 5 for 8 behind the arc and scored a game-high 16 points.

"Tonight, we were on with our three-point shooting," said Heinzelmann. "Matti is great; since her freshman year, every season she's progressively gotten better. When you have an offense like ours, and you have guys who can get into the lane and kick it out to her and know she's going to knock it down, that's a daggar to any defense."

Stone Ridge floor leader, Tish Hopewell, who will be playing college basketball at Northeastern next season, scored 13 points and her reach and defensive positioning continually produced steals and knock-aways against the Bullis offense.

In the last three quarters, more elbows, hip-checks and body blows were thrown than points were scored. The second quarter yielded 10 combined fouls as the Gators opened up a lead as large as 17 points, and Stone Ridge managed to convert just four field goals in the final half, but no basket was bigger than Vagnoni's wide-open three-ball with 2:42 remaining in the third quarter that gave the Gators a 39-24 against a comeback-minded Bullis squad.

Even in foul trouble, Belton managed to score 15 points including four field goals in the fourth quarter. Bullis' Dazia Hall chipped in with nine points.