Who's No. 1? Montini makes its case
Montini's girls basketball team is not one that needs a confidence booster.
But the Broncos sure got one Saturday.
Trailing defending Class 4A champion and top-ranked Whitney Young by 7 points late in the third quarter, Montini, the defending Class 3A champion and top-ranked 3A team, stormed back to beat the Dolphins 49-45 in the Mac Irvin Diabetes Classic at Larkin.
“It's a good win for the mindset of understanding they can play and beat any program,” said Montini coach Jason Nichols. “Just knowing you can play with somebody, and Whitney Young is somebody. But it doesn't mean anything if they don't keep ascending.”
Montini (8-0) trailed 34-27 after Young's Kiara Kewis scored with 4:12 left in the third quarter. But then the Broncos aggressively grabbed offensive rebounds and kicked passes out to junior Lea Kerstein, who hit back-to-back 3-pointers to make it a 34-33 game with 2:45 left in the third. After a Young turnover sophomore Claudia Kunzer nailed a 3 to put the Broncos ahead 36-34.
“When you get the ball and you're wide open you gotta shoot it,” said Kerstein, who led a balanced Montini attack with 11 points. “Those two open shots, I was going to hit them.”
Young, playing in its season opener, did come back to take a 38-36 lead after three quarters, but Montini had clearly taken the momentum from the Dolphins.
Kerstein hit a 2-point basket 27 seconds into the fourth quarter, but Young came back to re-establish a 4-point lead at 42-38 on two free throws from Lewis with 5:38 left in the game. But then Kerstein nailed another 3 to make it 42-41 17 seconds later, and after another Young turnover junior Tiara Wallace converted a three-point play that gave the Broncos the lead for good at 44-42 with 3:15 left. Kunzer's basket at the 2:33 mark made it 46-42, but senior Katrina Beck hit a 3-pointer with 2:21 left to make it 46-45.
Those were the last points Young scored. Montini made 3 of 5 from the free-throw line, two of them by Wallace, down the stretch to nail down the win.
“Claudia Kunzer and Tiara Wallace are two of the smallest kids on the floor and they went after it,” Nichols said. “They play a role. Every team has to have complimentary players and that's what these kids are. And Lea hit some monster shots.”
The magnitude of the win wasn't lost on Kerstein.
“Beating them, the No. 1 team in the state, is a real big confidence booster,” she said. “Our whole team is really pumped right now.”
Kunzer and Wallace added 8 points each for the Broncos, who shot just 19 of 56 from the field but had a 46-31 rebounding advantage, led by 10 boards from 6-foot-5 freshman Lindsey Jarosinski.
Young, which played without 5-9 senior Mississippi recruit Madinah Muhammad (broken hand), was 15-of-49 shooting but only 1 of 11 in the fourth quarter.
“We had a stretch where we weren't rebounding and that gave them the opportunity to win the game,” said Young coach Corry Irvin, a Larkin graduate. “We made some first-game mistakes, and being the first game there's some things they gotta figure out on their own. We just have to get better.”