Princeton girls beat Mendota for program’s 500th victory

PRINCETON – Princeton girls basketball started with humble beginnings, posting a 6-3 record during the 1973-74 season.

Fifty-one years later, the Tigresses have reached a milestone.

Princeton’s 51-21 win over Mendota Thursday night in Three Rivers East play at Prouty Gym was its 500th victory in program history.

“That’s so neat to put yourself in all of the history that has been Princeton girls basketball, all of the moments and coaches and players along the way,” PHS coach Tiffany Gonigam said. “The kids had no idea. Right before the game I wrote the number up there and told them, and you could just see the excitement in their eyes to just know they’re going to be a part of this moment and a part of something bigger than just this team and themselves.”

Junior point guard Camryn Driscoll, who led the Tigresses with 17 points, said it was cool to take part of the milestone victory.

“I am so excited we’ve been able to hit this milestone. We’ve been working very hard in practice as a team and it’s great to see our work show up in the result of our games,” she said.

The Tigresses’ overall record is 500-718, good for a .411 winning percentage.

PHS has won 14% (74) of those 500 wins in the last four seasons, including a single-season record of 27 wins in 2022-23.

On Thursday, the Tigresses (6-2, 2-0) jumped out to an 8-2 lead before the Trojans scored five straight to make it 8-7.

Then it was the Tigresses on full throttle, closing the first quarter on a 9-0 run and outscoring the Trojans 22-2 through the end of the second quarter to take a commanding 30-9 halftime lead.

“It was a little bit of a slow start for us, it felt like, but once we got things rolling, I just felt we got some good looks offensively,” Gonigam said. “Then we just clamped down defensively. We may have only given up two in the second quarter, and I think the two points prior to that were free throws after the 3-pointer.

“We’re really getting looks what we started in defensively, but the switch that we made we were really happy with. We just felt like we weren’t ourselves defensively, let’s make a switch and I thought that made a huge difference.”

Backing up Driscoll’s 17 were freshman Payton Brandt with seven points and Reese Reviglio and Keighley Davis (7 rebounds) with six each.

For Mendota (1-7, 0-2), Kennedy Knaff had seven points and Hayley Diaz and Ava Diaz five each.

The Princeton freshmen (42-27) and sophomores (33-15) both won in prelim games.