York, PA — If Saturday's season-opener was any indication, a perceived weakness of the Messiah women's basketball team may turn out to be one of its greatest strengths.
Messiah — ranked 13th in the pre-season USA Today/ESPN Top 25 Coaches Poll and 14th in the D3hoops.com ballot — rode career-high scoring outputs from three players to hand host York College an 82-76 loss, snuffing doubts about the team's offensive firepower in the process.
Despite graduating 54.2 percent of its scoring from last year's national runner-up team — including career 16.6 point-per-game scorer and two-time All-American Nikki Lobach — Messiah (1-0) scored more points Saturday than in 29 of its 33 games last year, connecting on 54.5 percent of its total field goals to cruise to the victory.
Senior Ashley Brooks carded a career-high 23 points, while freshman Angie Rapchinski added a collegiate-best 20. Senior guard Katie Kalb chipped in a career-high 16 points — 10 coming in the first half — helping Messiah to an early lead that it would not relinquish.
“This was a very, very good and tough game for us to open our season with,” said Mike Miller, Messiah head coach. “We shot the ball well and our offensive movement was good for the most part. This was a great test for us. York is a very, very good team that will win a lot of games this year. We may not have played particularly well during stretches, but we kept our mental toughness throughout. Nothing kept us from thinking about making the next play.”
Miller's team needed awhile to get going, as the Falcons committed eight of their 20 turnovers in the game's opening eight minutes. A three-pointer from Rapchinski turned a 13-11 York lead into a 14-13 Messiah advantage with 11:24 to play in the first half, while an interior bucket from senior Sal Shani switched a 16-15 Spartan lead to a 17-16 Falcons' edge.
It would be a lead tested but not lost, as a jumper from Kalb and another long ball from Rapchinski opened up a 22-18 gap. Back-to-back layups from Brooks and Shani opened the margin to eight, while a driving layup from junior Julie Henninger made the score 40-29, Messiah, moments before the intermission. The Falcons' lead was 41-33 at the break, as the squad buried 16 of 25 first-half shots (64 percent).
“Early in the game, we either would make a shot or make a turnover,” Miller said. “We're playing with four new starters, so we just needed to calm down a bit. Once that happened, I thought our ball movement got much better. York really focused on taking Sal away early, so Katie and Angie really stepped up. In the second half, their focus became more on them, and Ashley was simply awesome.”
Brooks scored 17 of her 23 in the second half, going nine for 10 from the field and four for five at the free throw line on the day. She became Messiah's personal security blanket, seemingly scoring at every necessary juncture: A Brooks layup pushed Messiah back to a seven-point lead with 13:24 to play, while a long ball from the forward turned a 66-57 game into a 69-57 difference with 3:34 remaining.
York (0-1) was able to pull within four points with just 31 seconds to play — the Spartans extended the game by fouling Messiah over the last 1:21 — but Miller's team made its last 10 free throws to ice things with little drama.
On the afternoon, Messiah was nearly as good from three-point land (seven of nine, 77.8 percent) as it was from the charity stripe (15 of 19, 78.9 percent). The Falcons limited York to just 32 of 71 shooting from the field (45.1 percent) while being especially burdensome on the Spartans' efforts from long-range (five of 18, 27.8 percent).
Shani and Henninger each finished with nine points, while Shani collected a game-high 12 rebounds. Senior Christa Wenrich (two points) and sophomore Michele Schleich (three points) rounded off Messiah's scoring, as Miller played just eight bodies.
“If a team tries to take something away from us, we have a lot of people that can really score,” Miller said. “That could very well become a staple of our team this year.”
Messiah will have nearly a week off before its next test, as the team will open the home portion of its slate Friday in its annual Messiah College/Wingate Hotel Invitational. Messiah will face Eastern University at 7:30 p.m. Friday. Grove City College and Ursinus College will meet in the evening's first game at 5:30 p.m. The winners of those two contests will then play Saturday at 3 p.m. for the tournament championship. The consolation game is set for 1 p.m. Saturday.
