Rosary wins season opener over IMSA

Updated: March 22, 2011 5:04PM

AURORA-- Normally, the start of the basketball season is a joyous occasion, filled with optimism and a lack of losses.

The Rosary basketball team had a mixed bag of emotions Monday night, coping with and memorializing the loss of eight-year sophomore basketball coach Scott Walker along with opening the season against visiting IMSA.

The Royals won 52-28, but you got the feeling Rosary would trade anything to have Walker back on the sideline following his abrupt death five months ago at age 47 from a heart attack.

"I've never been through anything like this before and hopefully I don't have to do it again," Rosary head coach Dave Beebe said. "It was a great tribute, but I kind of wondered what it would do mentally to our kids. Actually, they did a lot better mentally than I thought, but still some of them struggled in the game going through all of it."

Despite the emotional undertone with the dedication of a crucifix and the season in Walker's honor, Rosary did what they normally do, pressing teams into turnovers to pickup easy baskets in transition while taking advantage of a school that focuses on academics above all.

"We start on Nov. 1," IMSA coach Keith McIntosh said. "We don't have our girls during the summer so we don't play summer league games like other schools in the area. We have five sophomores and they're like freshman. I was pleased with our second half effort."

The Royals were led by senior Breann Maryanski's 14 points and 10 rebounds, but Maryanski and the rest of the team struggled to an 8-for-25 night at the free throw line.

"That was brutal," Beebe. "I told them that's probably the worst free throws we've ever shot since I've been here and I'm not exaggerating. That was just bad."

Maryanski tallied her statistics early as Rosary ran out to a 29-6 halftime lead and played its deep bench the rest of the game.

IMSA (0-1) responded to McIntosh's halftime pep talk and found a bit of a groove late in the game. 
"The speed of the game, we had to catch up with them," he said. "For two weeks in practice I've been saying 'This is too slow. This is not varsity level ball.' Rosary showed us varsity level ball. Second half we started getting into our defensive sets. We were out of position the whole game, which is where those layups were coming from."

The Titans were led by Alexandra Smick's nine points, while Seneca Hutson had eight.

© 2012 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.