ORINDA — Sue Phillips woke up Tuesday morning ready for practice.
When her alarm went off, it was unbeknownst to the girls basketball coach at Northern California powerhouse Archbishop Mitty that a few hours later her players would punch their ticket into Saturday’s state championships at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento.
Tuesday night’s NorCal Open Division title game, originally scheduled to be played at Gunn High in Palo Alto, required a last-minute change of venue because of coronavirus concerns.
Thereby, the top-seeded Monarchs took a nearly 120-mile round trip to Miramonte High and returned to San Jose as the NorCal champions after a 69-53 victory over No. 2 seed St. Joseph Notre Dame.
“I had my practice gear instead of my lucky coaching game-day outfit,” said Phillips, who thought the game would be postponed until Wednesday and didn’t show up to campus properly prepared. “So I had to go home, we had shoot-around, we jumped on the bus and we were ready to go. Kids were fired up to play.
“I don’t think this is necessarily a home game or a higher-seed venue, but we’ve got to be grateful given circumstances of the day and age, what’s going on in our community.”
Mitty (26-3) completed an unblemished run against its NorCal opponents, including a third triumph over SJND (24-8), the inaugural North Coast Section Open girls champion.
By virtue of this victory, the Monarchs earned a shot to avenge one of three losses in the state final Saturday at 6 p.m. against SoCal winner La Jolla Country Day, which prevailed in their Dec. 20 showdown at the Nike Tournament of Champions, 62-54.
“We’ve been preparing for this all year,” Mitty junior Hunter Hernandez said. “This is what we’ve wanted, so our focus will be as high as it’ll ever be and our focus and our intensity will be there, as well.”
Cal State Northridge-bound point guard Ashley Hiraki sat on the bench as a freshman in 2017, when the Monarchs finished as runner-up in the California Interscholastic Federation Open Division.
Mitty fell short of expectations the past two postseasons as the No. 1 seed in the NorCal playoffs, but finally has another chance to claim a seventh state title in program history.
“It’s amazing,” Hiraki said. “For me, heading back is just a dream.”
St. Joseph Notre Dame, which earlier this season lost twice to Mitty in a six-day span by scores of 75-39 and 60-39, came out with a different game plan.
“I said, ‘You know what, we’re not going to give them an inch. Let’s go out and press them and see what they’re made of and if they can handle it,’” SJND interim coach Brian Sato said.
The full-court press paid dividends right away, forcing nine turnovers in the opening eight minutes as the Pilots never trailed in the first quarter.
“It was very uncharacteristic of our team to play on our heels,” Phillips said. “To their credit, they really got in us and sped us up and we weren’t prepared for that type of pressure, which is bizarre.”
The Monarchs weathered the storm by making a living on the charity stripe. SJND was whistled by the refs 16 times in the first half, as Mitty went 16-of-20 from the line prior to intermission and went into the locker room up 31-28.
“I thought it killed our momentum, big time,” said Sato, who had two players foul out in the fourth quarter. “Every time we were making a run, the energy was up, it stopped. Whistle blow, whistle blowing. We could do nothing without getting a foul.”
The Monarchs, who defeated every NorCal foe by at least 20 points until Tuesday night, caught fire in the third quarter and drained four 3-pointers to go up 54-38 with eight minutes left.
Hiraki delivered 14 of her game-high 18 points in the second half.
“For me, I just wanted to go back so bad,” Hiraki said. “So if that meant if I’m taking shots or if I’m looking for my players, I was going to do whatever it takes.”
“It’s not just Ashley scoring, but her ability to defend,” Phillips said. “She drew charges, had multiple steals, she controlled the tempo. I can’t say enough about Ashley, not only her productivity on the court but as a leader.”
Mitty junior Olivia Williams and Hunter Hernandez also cracked double-digits with 11 and 10 points, respectively.
After the postgame speech, Hernandez walked back onto the court with her left knee wrapped in ice.
“To think that she suffered an ACL injury in July and is contributing at this kind of level in the NorCal finals is just a testament to her work ethic and mental toughness,” Phillips said.
“It’s definitely paid off,” Hernandez said of her rehab. “And from when it happened my teammates would always be there for me. No one ever doubted me, they always helped me and encouraged me to be better and to get back to where I was.”
SJND says goodbye to a trio of seniors — Malia Mastora, Malia Lepolo and Sophie Nilsson — who played key roles as freshmen for a NorCal Division IV runner-up.
In mid-January, the Pilots lost their mentor Shawn Hipol, who stepped away after a disagreement with an administrator over lopsided results against inferior league opponents.
The girls refused to go through the motions or quit.
“The word I use to describe them is overachievers,” Sato said. “They counted us out from the get-go and I think they rode a rollercoaster of emotion, but I think that losing Hip brought them closer together and it built some type of fire and leadership, which was amazing. I feel that really is what changed the tone of the season.”
The one hurdle the Pilots couldn’t climb?
Archbishop Mitty, the undisputed NorCal champion.
“I feel like with this team, it’s not just one person we’re relying on,” Hiraki said. “It’s everyone.”