Here is the story by Lauren Knego of NJ.com
Everything that the Elizabeth coaching staff has been preaching to its players this season has finally started to sink in the last two weeks.
And it’s paid very large dividends.
After losing three-straight games, the Minutemen were awarded the No. 4 seed in the Union County Tournament and advanced to the final after close victories over 13th-seeded Union Catholic and fifth-seeded Scotch Plains-Fanwood and a 64-56 upset win over top-seeded New Providence, then-ranked No. 12 in the NJ.com Top 20.
Those three wins set up a meeting with second-seeded Cranford in Sunday’s tournament final at Kean University. The Minutemen had already lost twice to the Cougars as both teams play in the Watchung Division, but the two losses were by three points on Jan. 6 and two points on Jan. 30.
Elizabeth used that familiarity to its advantage, and even though head coach Chrystal Rinehold wasn’t behind the bench as she is currently out on maternity leave, assistant coach Donald Johnson and the rest of the staff helped to steer the Minutemen to their first county title since 1997 with a 59-57 overtime victory.
“I think they’re realizing that they can be really good. They’re young, a little bit immature at times, but now it’s starting to kick in,” Johnson said. “Last week they were like, ‘Alright, we got opportunities to win the counties, maybe even win the states,’ so now that they’re finally getting it, it’s late in February, but it’s good. Now that they’re actually getting it and they’re playing together, which we’ve wanted them to do the entire season, which (Rinehold) preached the entire season of being a family, staying together no matter what. Now they’re actually doing it.”
Coming off the upset win of New Providence in the semifinals, a team that had won its second-straight UCT title and the Group 2 crown last year, the Minutemen started to believe that they could play with – and beat – anybody.
“Knowing that we beat them, I knew we could beat anybody that comes our way,” Elizabeth’s Alani Gordon said. “Play as a team and no selfishness, we’ll be fine.”
That momentum helped fuel Elizabeth against a tough Cranford team that matched the Minutemen almost point-for-point on Sunday afternoon. Elizabeth led 53-50 with 22.2 seconds remaining in regulation, but Cranford’s Sophia DeMarco hit a 3 with 9.8 seconds left to send the game to overtime.
“We just had to lock in and say alright, we still have another chance to win it and just close it out,” Elizabeth’s Alexandra Koon said. “As long as we all play together, focus and just play smart.”
With 3:34 left, Koon was fouled and hit one of two for a 54-53 lead, but a basket from Bella Curanovic put Cranford back in front 55-54 with 3:26 left.
A basket from Jah’nae Lembrick put the Minutemen back in front 56-55 with 2:14 remaining, and Koon then hit one of two with 1:12 to play for a 57-55 lead. Another basket from Curanovic again tied the game 57-57 with 56.8 seconds left, but Koon scored the game-winner with 4.2 seconds remaining and Elizabeth was able to run out the clock for the 59-57 win.
“We all had to focus in and just all have the mindset that we want to win the championship, because every time we played Cranford we lost by three or two,” Koon said. “So we just wanted to redeem ourselves this time when it really, really mattered.
“It feels amazing, this is something I can tell my future kids and grandkids. It’s a dream come true, I’ve always this to happen since I was little.”
Cranford led 9-7 after one and 22-20 at the half after hitting four-straight free throws in the final 1:06 of the quarter. The third quarter saw two ties and four lead changes as Elizabeth overcame its biggest deficit of the game after Cranford took a 28-22 lead after a 6-0 run with 5:52 left.
The Minutemen then went on a 7-0 run of their own to retake the lead 29-28 with 4:09 remaining, but a three-point play from Curanovic put the Cougars up 31-29 with 3:27 left. Koon retied the game 31-31 with 3:09 to play, but Cranford went on a 5-0 run and led 36-31 with 1:40 left.
With 1:11 to play, Lembrick hit one of two free throws and the third quarter ended with Cranford up 36-32.
“Honestly it was just to come together because the first two times we broke apart in the fourth quarter, and today we just had to come together, play as a team and work even harder to stop them,” Elizabeth’s Alani Gordon. “And we talked on defense more to know when to rotate and where the screens were coming from.”
For Cranford, which was coming off a 12-13 season last year, the loss to Elizabeth snapped a four-game win streak. Curanovic finished with a game-high 25 points and pulled down nine rebounds. DeMarco scored 12 points on four 3-pointers and Lily Costello finished with nine points. Maddy DeLong added eight points and six rebounds.
Koon posted a double-double with 21 points and 11 rebounds for Elizabeth, while Ashanti Dewait contributed 13 points and three rebounds. Gordon recorded 11 points and two rebounds and Lembrick chipped in 10 points and three rebounds.
“I think they’re more sound defensively, we gave up more points than I would have liked but at the end running our offense, usually when we play against zone it kind of frustrates us a little bit, but we did a better job of not just settling for jump shots when we needed to get layups,” Johnson said. “Just paying more detail to the players that they had, who’s doing what and just trying to play our game the way we needed to play our game.”
