Bonita One Step Closer to Achieving the Dream, Down Amat 65-53
The San Gabriel Valley Tribune's Fred Robledo interview Bonita's Nikki Wheatley after the game.
The Lady Bearcats aren’t going to Hollywood. They’re going somewhere better — the Southern Section 3A CIF Finals. They earned that right after piercing the Bishop Amat Lancers 65-53 behind freshman point guard Nikki Wheatley’s 26 points.
Wheatley’s performance was reminiscent of the performance of another rookie, Magic Johnson, when he seemingly willed the Lakers to victory over the Philadelphia 76ers in the 1980 NBA Finals. Wheatley scored early, often and late, driving to the basket or raining three-pointers when her team needed her most.
“She’s been in big games all of her life,” Bonita coach Darren Baumunk said, shouting over the Lancer band. “She’s used to it.”
But Bonita’s victory was hardly a one-woman act. Four Bearcats scored in double figures, giving Bonita the kind of balanced attack that coaches dream of. Like the 2011 Boston Celtics, with Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Rajon Rondo, the Bearcats also boast a Big Four with Wheatley (26 points), Taylor Anderson (15 points), Madison Zylstra (13 points), and Brianna Kennedy (11 points).
“If they don’t want to pick up Wheatley,” Baumunk said, “we’ve got Madison to shoot the ball, we got Taylor to go to the basket, we got Bree inside, Jaclyn (Smith) can drive the basket. We got other girls who can pick it up and help out. They’re gamers.
Jaclyn Smith leads a pack of excited Bearcats on to the floor after the Bearcats victory.
“Our girls deserve this,” Baumunk added. “We’ve been on a mission since we lost last year in the semis. I told the girls we were too weak, we were too soft. We had to get aggressive.”
When Bonita lost to Amat earlier this year, Baumunk used it as a rallying cry to play better in the rematch.
“Our girls knew when that game was over, we should have won that game,” he said. “We believed we could have won that game.”
Belief is now reality.
Bishop Amat took the first quarter 13-11 behind Leah Powell’s nine points. Meanwhile, Wheatley scored six of Bonita’s first eight points to keep the contest close. In the second quarter, both teams played exciting, physical basketball, with Amat taking a 30-26 lead into the locker room. Despite being down by four, Baumunk had to like the balanced scoring he was seeing on the floor from his starters. Zylstra had eight points, Taylor and Wheatley had seven points and Kennedy had four points.
To start the second half, Bonita went on a 9-0 run to go up, 35-30. Wheatley scored the first six of those points on two baskets and a pair of free throws. The Lancers pulled to within one point, 37-36 after a bucket by Powell, but then Zylstra responded with a three-pointer to put Bonita up, 40-36. Then after a Lancer miss, the officials charged Amat with a foul and a technical, sending Bonita to the line to shoot four straight free throws. Anderson sank the first two and Zlystra the next pair. Suddenly, the Bearcats led 44-36.
Baumunk said the technical fouls were a definite turning point in the game. Another was a key defensive change.
“We switched to man-to-man defense in the second half,” Baumunk said. “Bruce Becker said, ‘Let’s try man.’ I didn’t want to, but I said, ‘Fine, we’re going to try it.’”
The adjustment worked. “I don’t think they scored the first five or six minutes of the third quarter,” Baumunk noted.
Down the stretch, Bonita pushed the lead to 14 points on two occasions. The Lancers cut the Bonita’s lead to nine points, but got no closer.
But the Bearcats did.
“We’re one step closer,” Baumunk said about his team’s huge win. “We’re one step closer.”
Bonita will play Orange Lutheran next Saturday at the Anaheim Convention Center.
The Bearcats are now one game away from winning it all.
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