Kane hopeful Celtics can halt poor start as they suffer another loss at home to Trinity
Paige Cote on the ball for Liffey Celtics Photo: Sean Brilly
FloMAX Liffey Celtics guard, Brooke Kane believes the Leixlip side is not far off securing their opening win of the 2025/26 Domino’s Women’s Super League, despite seeing them go 0 and 4 in the table following Saturday night’s lost at home to Trinity Meteors.
While just four points separated the two sides at the half-time recess, a disappointing third quarter, in which they were outgunned by 13, proved extremely costly to Hillary Netsiyanwa’s team.
The Kildare side did manage to recoup six in the fourth, but it was not enough to reel in their Dublin rivals and secure that much sought-after first win of the season.
Kane, along with Áine O’Connor, did serve up a double double for Celtics on the night, with 15 points and 10 rebounds, and the American remains hopeful they can get up and running soon.
“At the moment, I feel like we're just learning how to work together and play together and find some sort of flow within our team that works,” she told The Kildare Nationalist.
“I think the talent is 100% there and we just have to find a way to use it.
“I feel like the last three games were definitely winnable games for us, but we’re just having a hard time keeping our runs going while stopping other teams’ runs, and just capitalising on their mistakes.
“If we can just cut back on half of our mistakes, I think we would be coming out on top, so hopefully something clicks and we start getting some wins under our belt,” she said.
Trinity were not long in opening their account on Saturday, Sarah Kenny striking from off the three-point line before getting in down the lane for a further deuce.
Celtics had to wait more than three minutes before getting off the mark themselves by way of an Áine O’Connor bucket, but Trinity manage to push their advantage out to eight as Kylie Horstmeyer and former Celtics guard, Hazel Finn struck from the paint before Ava Learn drained a fine effort from downtown.
Yet the hosts managed to serve up six unanswered points from Kane and Sorcha Tiernan to close the gap to just two (15-13) by the end of the first quarter.
It remained tight for the opening five minutes of the second, but scores from Horstmeyer and Franciska Treiliha, along with an ‘and one’ by Aisling Moran, helped see the visitors open up a ten-point gap.
But back came Celtics again with eight unanswered points, Paige Cote, Tiernan and Kane delivering when they really needed it to help haul them back to within four of their opponents (30-26) by the half-time recess.
Still, having seen none of their 11 three-point attempts drop in the first half, and with just a 55 percent success rate inside, Celtics really needed to discover some form on offence if they were to have any chance of registering their first win of the campaign.
Instead, the roof caved in on them in the third quarter as Trinity outgunned them by 13, Finn setting the tone when she made a steal and layup to ignite that decisive surge.
That was soon followed by a nine-point run for the visitors that featured inside buckets from Sarah Kenny and a three from Aisling Moran.
Celtics went for more than five minutes without a score, Cote eventually adding to their tally. And, while Kelly Bracken and Tiernan did serve up a further five points in the closing minute of the third, the hosts still faced a 17-point deficit (55-38) heading into the final period.
They struggled to make any in-roads into that lead, and while they did account for the game’s final nine points, including threes from Kate O’Flaherty and O’Connor, it was not enough to seriously threaten Trinity’s grip on this contest.
Speaking after Saturday’s defeat, Liffey boss Netsiyanwa said “We're shooting 20 percent from three, we're shooting 42% from the field, so that's going to hurt any team, especially when you’re fighting to get back into it. Those things are just momentum killers.
“I think every team has a bad day, but we've had a couple of them now and starting off the season zero and four, it's never a positive thing. It's going to hurt.
“But when you look at the numbers in the box scores of all of these games we've played so far, they've been winnable games and we've let them slip,” he sighed.
Brooke Kane, Kate O’Flaherty, Kelly Bracken, Paige Cote, Clara Boyce, Sorcha Tiernan, Áine O’Connor.
Top Scorers: Áine O’Connor (16), Brooke Kane (15), Paige Cote (10), Sorcha Tiernan (9).
Hazel Finn, Catherine Connaire, Sarah Kenny, Helena Keane, Aisling Moran, Franciska Treiliha, Ava Learn, Kira Lynch, Kylie Horstmeyer.
Sarah Kenny (14), Franciska Treiliha (11), Hazel Finn (10), Ava Learn (9).
