Monday, December 19, 2011

By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director

Jenna Albanese knocked down a 3-pointer at the buzzer to give Emerson a 33-32 win over Bergenfield at the Dr. Steven Kaminsky Hoops 4 Hope Challenge on Sunday.

BERGENFIELD – It is a compressed time frame from the start of practice to the start of the basketball regular season, even more so this year as the Thanksgiving weekend was off limits. The preseason began last Monday, less than two weeks before games were scheduled to count. Some little things were bound to be missed as coaches rushed to prepare their teams and one of them came to light on Sunday at the end of the second of four games played in the Dr. Steven Kaminsky Hoops 4 Hope Challenge at Bergenfield High School.

The whole chain of events started when Emerson's Jaclyn Boselli grabbed a rebound of a missed Bergenfield free throw with five seconds remaining in the game. Boselli out-letted the ball to Marissa Cernigia, who pushed it up the floor and then arced a pass for Jenna Albanese, who was barely behind the 3-point line on the left wing.

Albanese didn't hesitate and banked in the game-winning 3-pointer at the buzzer to give Emerson its only lead of the second half and the only one it needed to pull off a stunning 33-32 victory over the host Bears. Only problem was Emerson head coach Jenny Jurjevic hadn't had time yet to put in the script for buzzer-beating game-winners and the Cavos had to improvise.

Kaitlyn McCue scored 10 points to lead Bergenfield.

“[Albanese] looked at me and I looked at her and I don't think either one of us could really believe it,” said Jurjevic. “For a kid like that in her senior year, and I think basketball is the only game she plays, to hit the game-winning shot, you remember stuff like that. She is going to remember that 10 years down the line and I am just happy that it was her.”

To make the shot was dramatic enough, but did Albanese really mean to add to the degree of difficulty by using the backboard from 20 feet out?

“No,” said Albanese, honestly. “Actually I banked in a free throw at halftime and I was like, wait, what? So it was a little funny that I banked in the 3, but I didn't mean it.”

Albanese hit Emerson's only two 3-pointers of the game and they provided her team with its only two leads. Her first one came 2:22 into the first quarter and staked the Cavos to a 5-2 advantage and the second one, well we already covered that. In between Albanese's treys, Bergenfield looked it was going to pull away at times or at least hold on for the win at others.

Jaclyn Boselli grabbed the rebound that led to Emerson's game-winning shot.

Bergenfield led 13-8 after the first quarter and went on a 6-0 run early in the second that gave the Bears their largest lead of the game. Samantha Torres put back her own missed shot, Kaitlyn McCue scored on the fastbreak and Torres than knocked down a jumper from the wing off a kickout by Vanessa Amoh to put Bergenfield up 19-10 with 4:25 to go in the first half. The lead was 20-12 before Emerson closed to within 22-16 at halftime.

It wasn't a shootout and the lack of made field goals was the result of quality play on both sides. There was nothing fancy, no full court presses and no halfcourt traps. Jurjevic and Bergenfield head coach Erik Olsen both decided to play old school man-to-man for 32 minutes.

Bergenfield (1-1) took a pair of 8-point leads in the third quarter, the first when Jessi Corredor hit a pull up jumper from the foul line to open the second half scoring and the second at 26-18 when Torres finished a drive to the basket with 6:06 left in the third. But Emerson, which has all five of its starters back (and all five of them are seniors) from last season's team that won the North 1, Group 1 state sectional title, kept itself in the game with a combination of solid defense, steady rebounding and timely baskets.

Tara DeThomasis' lone two field goals came to close the third quarter scoring and to open the fourth. She hit a jumper from the corner to get Emerson to within 28-26 with 7:01 to play in the game and the Cavos drew to within one point at 29-28 and at 31-30, but had trouble getting over the hump. With 59 seconds left, Boselli scored on a drive to the basket, but the two points were wiped out when she was called for a charge. Emerson had three other shots to take the lead, but misfired on all of them and turned the ball over on two other occasions, giving Bergenfield more than a couple of chances to ice the game.

Point guard Jessi Corredor, Bergenfield's lone senior starter, finished with 9 points.

But the Bears threw away an inbounds pass, missed the front end of a 1-and-1 with 17.8 seconds to play and made only one-of-two on their final trip to the line with five seconds left, leaving just enough time and space for Albanese to play the part of 'Hero for a Day.'

Bergenfield, which opened the season with a win over Fort Lee on Friday, has high hopes for this season with Corredor (9 points), the senior point guard, surrounded by a bunch of talented sophomores like Danielle LaPorta, Nicole Henderson, Amoh, and McCue getting their feet wet on the varsity level. Torres led the Bears with 10 points on Sunday, McCue (6 points), LaPorta and Henderson combined for 10 and junior Stephanie Mirada made all three of her fourth quarter free throws to account for the rest of Bergenfield's scoring.

“As excited as we are about our team and how we are playing, I have step back and remember that, for some of these kids, this was just their second varsity game ever. It's hard because I know the potential we have and how well we practice, but the one thing you can't teach as a coach is experience. It just has to happen,” said Olsen. “You have to go through a situation like the one we were in today up two late and maybe the next time we are in it some things will happen differently.”

The experience factor was clearly on the side of Emerson (2-0), which has gone from a nice little Group 1 story to a formidable opponent against any team it runs up against with is seasoned starting five

Deanna Eyerkuss scored 9 points for Emerson, which improved to 2-0.

“We battled possession by possession and you have to when you go up against a bigger team like [Bergenfield] that is big and powerful. We knew that we wanted to play some tough out of conference games and if we want to play with them, we had to play man-to-man in a possession by possession game. Today we did. We were focused and we were into it,” said Jurjevic. “I don't want to underestimate my kids, but Group 1 basketball is so different than what everybody else is playing. For us to be able to play up to their level, it was a preseason goal of ours. Definitely an exciting victory, but we have to right back in the gym and prepare for Midland Park. This was definitely great. We will square away and recognize and celebrate now, but we have to go back to the drawing board come Monday.”

Albanese and Boselli each finished with 10 points to lead Emerson while Deanna Eyerkuss (9 points) and DeThomasis (4 points) accounted for the rest of the Cavos' points as four players accounted for all of their scoring. Having been through so much together already and with a real chance to go out in style as seniors, Emerson's starting five is more than happy to share the ball and the acclaim.

“We train so much, we work out everyday and we are always together. Bergenfield is a great team and, as you saw, they were a great challenge, but this shows us how we've progressed into the team that we are now and how much better we have gotten,” said Eyerkuss, the Cavos' leading scorer last year. “The plan is to go game by game. We don't have a huge list, we look at each game as its own and the goal is to win every game as it comes.”

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