Senior Gabby Micucci scored 28 points, just four short of 1,000 for her career for Emerson, which improved to 13-2 with a win at Pascack Hills on Saturday morning.
MONTVALE – Group 1 athletic programs in North Jersey rarely list quantity among their greatest strengths. It's about making the most of the opportunity when a quality core comes through and that is what the Emerson girls basketball team is doing right now. With only 11 players in the entire program from top to bottom, the Cavos picked up win No. 13 on Saturday morning by going on the road and spoiling Pascack Hills' Senior Day in Montvale.
The 58-43 victory, their eighth in a row, moved the Cavos to 13-2 on the season, put them in a good spot to make the main draw of the 24-team Bergen County Tournament and gave senior guard Gabby Micucci the chance to further close the gap between her and the 1,000-career point milestone.
"The leagues [in the NJIC] have been realigned this year so I think that records are skewed a little bit, but I am hoping for this to be the first time since the start of this format with the [Bergen] Invitational Tournament that we are in the Top 24," said Colleen Malzahn, who is in her 14th season as Emerson's head coach. "We have not been there before since this started, so it would mean a lot if we could get one of those spots somewhere from No. 20 to 24. It would be great."
The seeding meeting was held on Sunday morning and Malzahn's best case scenario turned out to be a little light. When the first round kicks off on Thursday Emerson, the newly-minted No. 18 seed, will visit No. 15 Ramsey and it will probably be with Micucci as the newest member of the 1,000-point club. She was brilliant with a game-high 28 points against Pascack Hills and, with a game against Mary Help of Christians scheduled for Tuesday, she needs just four more to crack four digits for her career.
"I am a few points away now and it is a great accomplishment for an individual, but it is more about us as a team," said Micucci. "In our next game on Tuesday it is not about me reaching a milestone. It is about us getting a huge league win and securing a league title."
Looking for an NJIC/Big North crossover win to cement its resume, Emerson came out hot once Pascack Hills' Senior Day festivities (slightly delayed by a photographer who showed up a few minutes late) ended. The Cavos jumped out to a 15-6 lead, partly against the Broncos' unfamiliar starting five.
Olivia Juliano came off the bench to lead Pascack Hills with 15 points.
Olivia Juliano helped stabilize Pascack Hills with two free throws that made it 15-8 after the first quarter. Three straight Emily Driver 3-pointers in the span of 2:54 got the Broncos as close as 23-19 in the second period before Mincucci's two free throws bumped the Emerson lead back up six points at the intermission.
Pascack Hills was playing for a spot in the main draw also, and Juliano scored 9 of her team-high 15 points in the third quarter as the Broncos hung tough. Her 3-pointer 1:42 into the second half made it a two-point game, and her bucket off an in-bounds play had PH within 29-26 two minutes later. It was still a two-possession game inside the final two minutes of the third period as Brooke Sawyer's elbow jumper made it 35-31 before Emerson ran off a 7-0 spurt to reassert control.
The Cavos led 37-31 heading into the fourth quarter, by 46-39 with four minutes left and then pushed the lead into double digits for the first time and for good, 51-39, when Mackenzie Dillon scored on the fastbreak with 3:20 left to play.
"This was a great win for us on a Saturday morning. [Pascack Hills] is a tough team, they have some good wins and we knew it was going to be a battle," said Malzahn. "We knew they would make some runs, that we would have to withstand them and we did that."
Emerson's starting five is a mix of two seniors, Micucci and Kylie Grompone, two sophomores, Mackenzie Dillon and Jillian Canino and a junior, Demitra Koutsothanasis, and that group combined to score all of its points. Micucci, Dillon (15 points) and Grampone (10 points) all finished in double figures while Canino and Koutsothanasis each made fourth quarter field goals for the Cavos, who have earned their spot in the Bergen County Big Girl Tournament.
Sophomore Mackenzie Dillon finished with 15 points for Emerson, which earned the No. 18 seed in the Bergen County Tournament..
"We always have a reason to go out and give it our all because we want to show that even though our school is small and just because our town is small it does not mean that we can't compete with the bigger schools, the regional schools," said Grampone. "We never use that as an excuse and we see every game against a bigger opponent as a chance to show that we have real talent here."
Micucci is having the kind of senior season that she was hoping for and will get a chance to show off four years of hard work inside the program on the elevated stage of the Bergen County Tournament.
"I have been playing for the last four years and we have never been in the real county tournament. We have always been in The BIT, so I know that everyone is super excited," said Micucci. "I am not playing in college, but I love basketball and I am so excited to live out this last month with the people that I love...this team. The team this year is really something special and I am so looking forward to see what we can do the rest of the way."
Juliano scored 15 points off the bench to top the Broncos on Saturday to lead Pascack Hills (4-9), which wound up three spots shy of the main Bergen County Tournament. The Broncos will play in what the BCWCA calls the Basketball Consolation as the No. 25 seed and will host No. 40 Dwight Morrow in the opening round.
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