GAME PHOTOS: http://smu.gs/2CgNxTX
The Berkshire Badgers managed just four points in the first quarter of their rivalry game against Cardinal, trailing 11-4 with a sluggish start. After the game head coach Dennis Lory knew why.
“How many points did Kayla have in that first quarter?” he asked with a smile, knowing the answer full well.
It was zero.
So Lory pulled that senior, Kayla White, and talked to her about her intensity.
In the second quarter White dominated, scoring 11 points and leading her team to a 21-3 run that ended any momentum Cardinal falsely thought they had.
The final score was 43-31 Berkshire.
“I told Kayla she wasn’t involved enough,” Lory said. “She got off to a slow start, but then she kicked it in gear.”
White finished the night with a game-high 17 points and eight rebounds. Her soft-touch jumper from 15 feet and in, and fundamental post moves, were unstoppable at times.
The Badgers game plan never wavered. Berkshire ran a 3-2 zone in its half-court defense with senior Joanne Miller at the top. Miller is a traditional post player, but her wingspan and ability to anticipate where the ball was going forced Cardinal into bad passes.
Even when the Huskies got the ball to their guards, they were too far out to take a shot.
“She is the most unheralded player on our team,” Lory said of Miller. “She stops shooters, and she does a phenomenal job up there.”
The Badgers will finish 2017 with a 6-3 record and look to use their four starter seniors — White, Miller, Cat Lillibridge and Rachel Breckenridge — to keep the momentum going in 2018.
Breckenridge finished with eight points.
“It’s always great to win at home, especially against Cardinal,” Breckenridge said.
Senior leadership allowed Berkshire to not panic despite the slow start.
“We usually start off kind of rough,” Breckenridge said. “But in the second quarter we always play hard. Once we mesh a little bit, we get our defense and rebounding going. We try to keep everyone under control.”
Berkshire’s Madison Chapman and Lexi Caponi are two more inside presence players that made it hard on Cardinal.
The ties between these two schools run deep. For example, Luke Kruse played basketball his sophomore year at Cardinal in 2000. Dennis Lory was the varsity coach that year.
And Lory coached Lindsay Frank as Cardinal’s girls varsity coach. Lindsay is now Lindsay Cummins, the mother of Cardinal’s top player, junior Camille Cummins.
Camille is one of five talented juniors responsible for the team’s 7-4 start this season. Cardinal won only seven games all of last season.
“This junior class has really come into its own,” said Kruse. “They have a lot of talent, and now they are developing a lot of confidence.”
Camille finished with 14 points and seven rebounds on the night. This season she has averaged 13 and 13. Brittni Lawrence scored 10 points on the night.
“I think we got rushed,” Camille said of the last three quarters of the game. “Because we got down. When you’re down, it’s hard not to play rushed because you’re looking to score. We just didn’t set up our offense like Coach told us to.”
Kruse was a little frustrated after the game.
“There were a couple of things that had changed the tone of the game,” Kruse said.
For instance, Camille had to go to the bench in foul trouble, which helped Berkshire’s White have her big second quarter.
Kruse said the Huskies prepared for the zone against Berkshire, but abandoned the game plan early.
“It’s hard to maintain discipline when a team makes a big run on you,” the Cardinal coach said.
Still, Cardinal gets the next meeting on Feb. 10 at their high school gymnasium.
After 34 years coaching basketball at both schools, there is an expert in what that game could be like.
“They are going to be a handful at their place at the end of the year,” Lory said. “Trust me.”