Rosary's 17-0 start blitzes Glenbard East

Though Rosary might have taken its foot off the gas pedal Saturday in the third-place game of the Oswego Holiday Classic, the Royals had raced to such a big lead it didn't really matter.

Rosary scored the first 17 points of the game against Glenbard East, using its aggressive defense to force turnovers that led to transition scores.

The Royals settled for a 48-36 victory and the third-place trophy, a mild disappointment after they won the title the past two seasons.

"I thought we came out focused and the defense was outstanding," Royals coach Dave Beebe said. "On offense we were clicking, basically both ends of the court. That's the start we wanted against a DVC team."

Jordan Rettig's 12 points and 16 rebounds led the Royals, who beat Batavia last year in the championship game.

"I think we can even play better than that," Rettig said of the first quarter. "That's where we should be right now. We know that and we're going to be working toward that over the break."

Glenbard East (6-8) outscored Rosary (11-4) 35-31 over the final three quarters but the damage was done early.

Breann Maryanski's inside basket with 5:48 left in the first quarter began a stretch of 17 points that ended with Stephanie Haugen's 3-pointer with a minute left in the quarter.

In-between Glenbard East coach Nicole Miller called 2 timeouts, her team turned the ball over 10 times (to just 1 for Rosary) and the Rams missed all 5 of their field goal attempts.

Only Michaela Stranski's free throw with 4 seconds left in the quarter kept the Rams from going scoreless.

"That was great, we played together," Maryanski said. "We did well both defensively and offensively."

Rosary's lead ballooned to as much as 34-9 in the third quarter before Jamie Klepetka (10 points) and Olivia Trefilek (10 points, 8 rebounds) helped the Rams pull as close as 39-30 with 3:05 remaining.

"The second half was more of a walk-through," Beebe said. "We were hoping to get a lot of kids playing time and I told the starters you kind of ripped off you teammates because we didn't play much defense. But you have to give credit to them (Glenbard East), they came fighting and they came out aggressive. They are not just going to say it's over."

Rettig, Haugen and Katie Petrando all made the all-tournament team, as did Glenbard East seniors Klepetka and Nikki Hall.