Staff photo / Neel Madhavan Canfield’s Camie Dill (4) drives into the lane against Warren G. Harding’s Nadia McQueen on Wednesday during the Cardinals’ victory.

CANFIELD — A year ago, Camie Dill and Cami Hritz were role players on Canfield’s district championship team.

This season, they’ve become part of the driving force for a Cardinals team that hopes to defend its district title.

On Wednesday, Dill and Hritz combined to lead Canfield with 35 points, as the Cardinals stymied Warren G. Harding 61-33 in All-American Conference play. Dill finished with 18 points, while Hritz had 17.

“(Hritz) had struggled a few games and she had some tough shooting nights, but she’s one of the best shooters we’ve had here in a long time,” Canfield head coach Matt Reel said. “When she gets going, we’re a totally different team. I think (Dill) is really transitioning into a dynamic offensive and defensive player. I think her defense gets overlooked. She was not a good defender as a freshman, and she’s really worked to improve that. She’s become a pretty good defender and her awareness out there really makes us better.”

Both Hritz and Dill had similar scoring numbers last season, with the pair each averaging about four to five points per game. But each of them, along with Jenna Triveri, have taken a step forward in that department this season.

Against the Raiders, Hritz got Canfield going early by hitting two threes in the first quarter and scoring 13 of her points in the first half.

But then Dill picked things up after halftime, scoring three straight buckets in the third quarter.

“As the season’s gone on, I think (Dill’s) become more comfortable scoring, and she’s looking to score a little bit more,” Reel said. “Last year, she really didn’t need to score much for us except for some isolated areas. This year, she’s really started figuring out how to do that and just be patient with it and pick her spots better. She’s really developing as a player, even in her senior year.”

While Dill didn’t need to score much last year on a senior-laden team, she was still the team’s starting point guard and helped run the Cardinals’ offense. So she had plenty of varsity experience coming into this season.

But in Hritz’s case, she only played about 12 minutes per game last season. Still, this year, she’s made the leap to become a potent scoring weapon both inside the post with her 5-foot-10 size and on the outside with her lethal shooting touch.

“(Hritz) sometimes doesn’t believe how good she is, and I think she’s starting to figure out that she’s a really quality player and she doesn’t have to take a backseat to anybody,” Reel said. “Her and (Dill) for two years now have been two of our most dedicated kids, and they’re always in the gym. Our younger kids are starting to see that and they’re picking up on that.”

Early on, Canfield and Harding took turns trading baskets in the first quarter. But then toward the end of the period, the Cardinals went to a 2-3 zone and the Raiders struggled to regain their scoring touch.

Harding then went on a 3:30 scoring drought from the end of the first quarter to the start of the second quarter and only was able to score four points in the second quarter.

The Raiders finished the game shooting just 34.1% from the floor, while Trinity Taylor led them with 12 points.

“(Canfield) did a great job of switching up on us and that got us out of what we were trying to do,” Harding head coach Frank Caputo said. “We just need to do a better job. We practiced their zone, but we didn’t do a good job of executing what we wanted to do and get the ball down low.”

Next up, Canfield will visit Boardman on Saturday at 2:30 p.m., while Harding gets Austintown Fitch at home at 6:30 p.m. that same day.

“We’re just going to keep working,” Caputo said. “We got a really young crew and they’re learning as we go. But we just have to do a better job of executing what we practice. We do a good job in practice, but we gotta do a better job of executing (in game).”

nmadhavan@tribtoday.com