When St. Patrick Catholic was 7-5 during the regular season, coach Al Schrauben and his players probably weren’t thinking about going to the Class D state semifinals.
But the Shamrocks did indeed get that far and played at the Breslin Center against Our Lady of the Lakes Catholic on March 15. But the Lakers, leading only 34-31 going into the fourth quarter, outscored St. Patrick 20-13 in the final eight minutes en route to a 54-44 victory.
“They made their shots early and we got behind,” said 27-year St. Patrick coach Al Schrauben. “It was just a battle to the end. We’d get it where we felt good at halftime. Everytime we got it close, they had a little burst. I’m happy with how hard the girls played and the season they had. It hurts now, but I think they’ll realize what they accomplished.”
Courtney Dixon and Tori Goodrich led St. Patrick with seven points each.
Our Lady was able to get several baskets off steals from full court pressure to put away the game in the fourth quarter.
“They got a couple of quick baskets before we reacted, and that was probably the difference,” Schrauben said. “They went to their zone trap, and I didn’t feel we attacked it and didn’t have people where we needed them to be.”
“I’ll give credit to St. Patrick, they played well the whole game,” said Our Lady coach Steve Robak, whose team was going for a third straight state title. “We wanted to make sure we got the ball to the middle of the floor. We didn’t want just steals. We wanted to put pressure on the ball and make things uncomfortable for them.”
“I don’t think we were expecting there to be that much pressure,” St. Patrick player Stephanie Miros said. “They have a lot of good pressure and we just didn’t execute.”
Schrauben indicated he came to Breslin expecting to have success.
“I didn’t feel they were the favorite coming in. I thought if we played well and took care of business, it could have been a two- or four-point game,” Schrauben said. “It got away from us a little bit early. Today they were a little better than we were.”
Schrauben recalls when his team was only 7-5 at one stage of the season.
“I had done a horrible job of coaching at that point and trying to do things we probably weren’t capable of,” Schrauben said. “We slowed things down a little bit to take care of the ball better and let our defense take care of that. Then we became a good basketball team.”
“When we were 7-5, I didn’t think we’d get a district title,” Miros said. “We turned it around. We got things going, executed, and got our shots going. It’s a good feeling to get this far. We’re all friends on this team. It was great.”
“I told the girls there’s 165 teams that start the season and after that first week, there are only 32 left,” Schrauben said. “We’ve had some success. This is a special moment for every group of kids that come through. There are a lot of schools that haven’t won a district yet.”