<\/p>\n
It’s not uncommon to hear a school sing their alma mater after a basketball game\u2014but it’s never quite as special as the first time a group gets to sing it after winning a championship. <\/span>That was the moment the Saint Anthony Saints girls’ basketball team got to enjoy together after defeating Montclair Prep 57-47 in the CIF Division 5 championship game Thursday evening at Mater Dei\u2014a moment none of the players or coaches is likely to forget.<\/p>\n “This one is special,” said head coach James Anderson, who won his seventh CIF championship ring on Thursday, but his first coaching at his alma mater. <\/span>“It’s real special because it’s home. <\/span>To do it with these kids, who sacrificed so much\u2026I’m glad for the school, but overjoyed for them.” <\/span>It was the Saints’ first CIF title since a win in 2000. Junior leader Jourdan Cooper, who scored a team-high 12 points, said the final buzzer was an emotional moment for her. <\/span>“You just think of everything\u2026all the games we lost, and all the games we’ve won. <\/span>It’s been such a long journey to get here\u2014I’m so happy for the seniors.” Senior Rina Towne, one of the girls Anderson has worked with his entire tenure at St. Anthony, was red-eyed coming out of the locker room. <\/span>“It’s just very exciting,” she said. <\/span>“Just\u2026yeah.” The Saints certainly asserted their will in the game, which served not just to affirm their top-seeded status in the bracket, but to get some revenge on Montclair Prep, who blew them out in the quarterfinals last year. <\/span>From the opening tip, it was obvious the Saints were the taller, faster, deeper team\u2014the Mounties suited just seven players for the game. The Saints went down 2-0 to start the game, and would never again trail till the finish, playing an intelligent game that worked to their strengths. <\/span>For one, once they saw the refs were calling a tight game (to say the least\u2014four girls fouled out and two more finished with four fouls, in a 42-whistle affair), St. Anthony made the effort to drive into the paint and draw contact. <\/span>Towne in particular helped create separation in the third quarter by picking up fouls. <\/span>The Saints also shot the ball well from the stripe, going 13-19 while their opponent was just 14-29. They pounded the ball inside effectively too, as the Cooper sisters and post player Natalie Williams combined for 27 points in the paint (Williams had a game-high 11 boards, too). <\/span>St. Anthony players were smart about keeping the ball high after pulling down offensive boards (they had 16), allowing a lot of easy second-chance points. After opening up a 13-point lead after three quarters, the Saints let the Mounties back in in the fourth, as it narrowed to 51-44, before they sealed the game with good free throw shooting. “We wanted to be patient today,” said Anderson. <\/span>“We did some good things, and some real stupid things…your heart can get you through a half, but your head gets you through a game.” <\/span>It’s a sign of how good things look at St. Anthony right now that there are aspects of a championship performance to improve on\u2014happily, the Saints will get their shot next week, as they’re guaranteed a berth in the state playoffs, which will begin on Tuesday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Saints proved their dominance, winning a CIF Championship in a hard-fought game against the Montclair Prep Mounties, on Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-1897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1897\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1897"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=1897"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}