Practice pays off for St. Edwards' Pozezinski in win over Nazareth
After going just 1-for-4 at the free-throw line in the first half, St. Edward senior Megan Pozezinski spent the better part of the halftime break shooting free throws at a side basket.
"Because I was missing in the first half I just wanted to make sure I'd make them in the second half," said Pozezinski, who missed last season's Green Wave run to state with an ACL injury.
Well, practice made perfect for Pozezinski and the Wave as she calmly sank 2 free throws with 12 seconds left on the clock to give St. Edward (4-1) a 47-46 nonconference win over previously unbeaten Class 3A Nazareth Academy Saturday night in Elgin.
Senior Celeste VonAhnen recorded 2 of her 7 blocked shots in the game in the final 6 seconds to help the Wave preserve a hard-fought win that was anything but pretty.
"I don't know what we ended up at the free-throw line but it wasn't good," said Wave coach Michelle Dawson. "But Poz came up big at the end and I thought we played good defense tonight. We gave up more 3-pointers than we like to but we played hard, and we held our turnovers down on offense which is something we've been wanting to do."
The Wave, which only turned the ball over 12 times, made only 10 of 26 from the line on the night and just 17 of 50 from the field. St. Edward played about half the game without junior scoring leader Katie Yohn, who was in foul trouble all night and fouled out with 16 seconds to play.
Still, Yohn finished with a game-high 16 points, 13 of them in the second half as the Wave roared back from a 27-18 halftime deficit, the second straight night St. Edward has come back to win.
"Everyone contributed tonight," Dawson said. "Our freshman, Vincenza Ranallo played real well and Amanda DeBrocke really stepped up tonight. That's the first time this year we've had to play without Katie on the floor for that long and I also thought Kelly Knott did a nice job of running things, especially when Katie was out."
VonAhnen had 11 points and 19 rebounds for the Wave while DeBrocke had 8 points and 7 rebounds and Ranallo added 7 important points.
The Wave suffered through 1 of 12 first-quarter shooting and fell behind 15-7 as Nazareth (6-1) hit two of its seven 3-pointers in the first period.
After trailing by 9 at halftime, St. Edward came out and opened the third quarter with a 9-2 run that put it back in the game. Yohn scored 5 of those 9 points.
The Wave took its first lead when DeBrocke grabbed a VonAhnen miss and scored with 3:21 left to make it 43-42.
Ellyn Vranicar led Nazareth with 11 points.