By JOHN ANDERSON, photos by Drew Golden of The Golden Lens
Hornell and Southwestern have had sights set on state championships for years. Both girls’ teams had sectional championship seasons end by perennial-power Waterloo.
Last year, Hornell won the Section V title then lost to Waterloo, 48-38 as Waterloo went on to win a state championship, scoring over 120 points in the final four. In 2005, Southwestern won sectionals, but lost to Waterloo.
While Waterloo had a rare down season this year, Hornell has been quite a story the past three years, winning with limited upperclassman, a team that could be confused with a track and field team that shoots 3-pointers before they get off the bus.
Southwestern is building the program back up and a 58-43 win over Portville gave the Trojans the Section VI title and a chance at Hornell on Saturday at 2 p.m. at Finger Lakes Community College. Hornell downed Dansville, 44-36 to get here.
“We are expecting it to be a battle. When you get to this point in the season there’s no weak competition left to play, so we know we’ve got to bring our best. It’s been our expectation to end up seeing Southwestern in this game even though they had a tough start to their season, so we’re aware of the level of competition we’re facing,” said Hornell coach Jim Dagon. “I think the most important thing for us is going to be to play to our strengths and execute the things that we have done well all season. We are a team with multiple weapons, and we play extremely unselfishly, as long as we can continue to play that way, defend tough, and make the hustle plays for 32 minutes, I will be very proud of my girls.”
One of Hornell’s top scorers, Jordyn Drying, is out with a leg injury, and did not play more than a handful of minutes in the Section V title game. Southwestern is led by senior Reece Beaver, who scored 18 in the title game against Portville. Beaver, whose aunt is the head coach, is Chautauqua County’s all-time leading scorer.
Beaver averages 26.7 points a game, but is very unselfish as she hands out nearly five assists a game, ON defense, she has almost four steals a game. Bella Siruanni scores 10 points a game, senior Maddie McIntyre scored seven a game and gets eight rebounds a game while senior forward Lauren Cotter is averaging five points and five boards a game.
Hornell is 21-3 and ranked #3 in New York State while Southwestern at 17-7 is ranked #9.
Hornell will be missing the sophomore Dyring who averaged 15 a game, five rebounds, 5.1 rebounds and 2.4 assists. However, Sophomore Selena Maldonado, who was Section V title game MVP, showed she can almost triple her 9.2 points a game. She also averages 6.5 assists, 5.4 rebounds and 3.5 steals a game.
If you have watched Maldonado play, 3.5 steals a game seems low!
Hornell is also led by sophomore Payton Bentley with 12.5 points a game and 7.7 rebounds, freshman Raegan Evingham (who was named to the Section V all-tournament team) with 10.5 points, 8.5 rebounds, 3.5 steals and 2.5 assists, junior Lillian Hoyt with 12.5 points a game and shoots over 40 percent from 3-point range.
When you see those stats, it explains how Hornell defeated Dansville without Dyring.
However, look past the stat sheet. The play of Mia Nasca and Kadience Gollnitz was something Dansville could not have prepared for or expected and helped the Red Raiders win again.
“In the finals, after losing Jordyn to injury it took a lot of mental toughness from the girls to persevere and come out with the win,” Dagon said. “This group is so close to one another that it was tough for them to focus on the game when they were worried about their friend at the trainer’s table. After the initial shock of the situation wore off, we had lost the lead and knew that we had to come together as a team to fight our way back into the game.”
And that’s exactly what happened. The Red Raiders had one eye on the trainers table and one on the floor. Dansville took a lead and kept it most of the game. But Hornell can play defense.
“We did a great job of getting stops in the second quarter which allowed us to keep the game close going into the halftime break. In the locker room, we made some adjustments to the offense not only to fit pieces together without having Jordyn on the floor but also to try and exploit the drop coverage defense that Dansville was playing,” Dagon said. “The girls kept their confidence and executed the plan that we drew up to perfection. Most of the girls were playing different positions than they’d played all year during the second half, but their trust in one another and the game plan was what helped us prevail. Selena Maldonado took on the scoring burden due to the game script and she came up with a monster 18-point second-half effort. Her teammates showed incredible unselfishness and willingness to do whatever it took to win by doing all the dirty work, playing great defense, and rebounding the ball extremely well.”
And that’s when the other stars emerged.
“Kadience Gollnitz and Mia Nasca stepped up big time for us, playing more minutes than normal. Kadience was tasked with defending Dansville’s star center Ainsley Belcher, and she held her to just 8 points. It was an amazing defensive effort by her,” Dagon added.
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