JCA girls drop ESCC decision to Marian Catholic

JOLIET – With a roster containing just one senior, three juniors, four sophomores and five freshmen, this season is going to be a learning experience for Joliet Catholic Academy‘s girls basketball team.

The Angels were able to hang with East Suburban Catholic Conference rival Marian Catholic for the first quarter and a half Monday night, but the Spartans' length and athleticism proved to be too much as they pulled away for a 56-26 victory.

Marian Catholic (6-1, 2-0) used hot outside shooting to jump out to a 17-3 lead, as Ty Jackson made a pair of 3-pointers and teammates Alainna Poisson and Vesta Radziute (game-high 12 points) each had one during that stretch.

Radziute hit another 3-pointer before the end of the quarter, and the Spartans took a 24-8 lead after the first quarter, with all eight of the points for the Angels (1-8, 0-2) coming from sophomore Abigail Dulinsky, who finished with a team-high 11 points.

JCA got a 3-pointers from Breanna Zafra and Allison Lesters to start the second quarter and trailed 27-14 after a basket by Marian’s Gracie Jensen (10 points, 7 rebounds). The Angels then went on a 6-0 run, getting back-to-back baskets from sophomore Emma Birsa (six points, six rebounds) and a pair of free throws by Lesters to pull to within 27-20 with 3:29 to play until halftime.

Unfortunately for the Angels, that was the last time they scored until 2:36 remained in the third.

“Our girls did a real nice job making that run in the second quarter, cutting it down to seven points,” JCA coach Jim O’Brien said. “But then Marian did a good job with their defense and we only scored six more points the rest of the way.

“I really liked what we did in the second quarter, but we gave them too many good looks. They hit five 3-pointers in the first quarter, and that was just too big a hole for us to get out of.”

Jensen scored the first five points of the third quarter for the Spartans before Dulinsky broke JCA’s scoreless stretch with a 3-pointer with 2:36 left in the quarter. Marian ended the quarter by getting a pair of 3-pointers by Radziute and led 49-23 entering the fourth.

Birsa scored to start the fourth quarter, but JCA did not score again until after Marian had built a 56-25 lead, invoking the running clock. Katelyn Munday scored the final JCA point with a free throw.

“We did some good things tonight,” O’Brien said. “We really didn’t turn the ball over much against their press, which we were worried about coming in. A lot of the turnovers we had weren’t because of their pressure, they were just unforced errors on our part.

“With such a young team, we are going to have those. As the season goes on and the girls get more accustomed to the speed and size of varsity players, we will get better. Unfortunately, the conference doesn’t get any easier. Marian is a good team and will give a lot of teams a lot of trouble this year. We took a big step with the way we played in the second quarter. Now we have to start putting quarters like that together.”