Girls Basketball: St Joseph wins two at Montini Tournament

Updated: December 28, 2011 3:22PM

Briya Wilborn’s legs may have been failing her, but the St. Joseph guard’s belief never did.

“Three minutes left, down by 2 points, that’s nothing,” Wilborn said. “That’s more than enough time to come back. I know as long as we play good defense, we don’t have anything to worry about. I fully trusted my team. I knew we were going to pull through.”

Trailing Bogan 42-40 with 3:17 remaining, No. 25 St. Joseph (11-2) closed on an 11-4 run that included a 9-of-12 effort from the free throw line to defeat the Bengals 51-46 at the Montini Christmas Tournament Tuesday in Lombard.

Both teams were playing the second of back-to-back games. Earlier, St. Joseph defeated Oak Park 73-64 while Bogan (8-6) fell to No. 22 Marian Catholic 62-48.

“It’s hard to get on them when they’re playing their second game of the day,” St. Joseph coach Jim Maley said. “You could tell a couple of them were dragging. Donna (Koerber) asked for a break and I couldn’t give it to her. Donna would never ask for a break.

“They were dragging,” the coach added. “It’s a relief to get out of that one alive.”

Koerber led St. Joseph with 16 points and six rebounds, Wilborn added 13 points and 5-foot-9 sophomore forward Chanel Brown added 10 points, 11 rebounds and four assists. Arriel Anderson finished with seven points.

“We ended up getting it together,” Wilborn said. “As long as we come out hard in the second half, I know my team, we’e going to pull through. We just had to stay calm. I just tried to keep all my teammates calm and keep them staying in the game.”

Wilborn and Koerber both turned in critical defensive plays with the game tied at 42-42 and a little more than two minutes remaining.

“I am happy with the way they picked it up with the game on the line,” Maley said. “It seems like they stepped it up a notch. Briya just goes off when the game’s on the line. She goes and gets the ball wherever it is.”

Jasmine Harris led Bogan with 11 points, Citlin Garanet added eight points and eight rebounds and China Davis had seven points.

“We missed free throws down the stretch and that really hurt us,” Bogan coach Gary Bell. “Had we made our free throws and made the simple shots, we would have been OK. We just became methodical and just stood there. All we had to do is keep going inside, be patient and don’t rush shots.”

© 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.