Staff photo / Brian Yauger Gia Diorio of Cardinal Mooney (11) goes up to the hoop in front of Warren G. Harding’s Kamarah Bender (00) during the second half of Monday’s game in Youngstown. Diorio scored six points during the Cardinals’ 53-45 loss to Harding.

YOUNGSTOWN — Monday’s game between Cardinal Mooney and Warren G. Harding was a tale of two halves.

The first was dominated by the Cardinals, but the Raiders controlled the pace in the second, beating Mooney, 53-45.

“I thought we played our hearts out,” Cardinals coach Jason Baker said. “We left it all out there, we just turned the ball over too many times. When you turn the ball over and give live-ball turnovers to a team as explosive as they are, it’s going to come back and bite you, and it did.”

In the first half, Mooney had the Raiders right where it wanted them. The high-paced Harding offense was held back and wasn’t able to get many open looks. The Cardinals had a hard press on them on defense, and the Mooney offense was scoring at will.

After the break, the Cardinals seemed to slow down, which allowed Harding to bounce back and set the tone early in the second half.

“We were a lot more aggressive to the basket,” Baker said. “We were the aggressors in the first half. We were able to get some people in foul trouble. Then, in the second half, we turned the ball over way too much to be able to do that.”

Mooney senior Katie Hough continued her hot scoring pace, registering a game-high 27 points for the Cardinals. Alaina Scavina added nine points.

During the break, Raiders coach Frank Caputo didn’t need a speech to rally the troops because the troops were already rallying themselves. While the Harding coaches had a brief meeting outside the locker room, the Raider seniors were already analyzing their first-half performance and discussing what to do to fix their issues.

“The senior leadership really stepped in,” Caputo said. “We made a couple adjustments and then Faith (Burch), Diamond (Phillips) and Kamarah (Bender) all said ‘Hey, if we can do this, this and this, we’re going to be in great shape’. Senior leadership like that can really get us going.”

That senior leadership shined on the court as well for the Raiders, with Bender leading the team with 20 points. Phillips scored 12 and Burch added 11.

Staff photo / Brian Yauger Mooney senior Katie Hough drives past the defense of Harding’s Makaila Powell. Hough finished with a game-high 27 points.

Up next for the Cardinals, they take on Chaney in the Cowgirls’ season-opening tilt.

For the Cardinals (4-4), maintaining possession of the ball will be crucial.

“We have got to take care of the basketball first and foremost,” Baker said. “I think we’re playing great half-court defense, but we just can not continue to let good teams get out in transition off of live-ball turnovers.

“Taking care of the basketball is the number-one key for everything. When we do that, we execute offensively, we open up lanes and we do a good job of being aggressive. … It just comes down to us taking care of the basketball.”

With the win, Harding moves to 1-0 on the season, and Caputo is happy with the resilience the team showed.

“I was real happy with our kids,” he said. “Second half, we came out, we had some adversity in the first half, our big three all had foul trouble in the first half. We buckled down, had a nice halftime talk. The girls had a lot of great comments about what they were doing incorrectly, and they kind of talked it out themselves.”

Harding’s next game is against Chaney on Friday in a doubleheader with the boys. The Raiders face Howland on Saturday.

byauger@tribtoday.com