No. 1 BROOKSWOOD 69 No. 2 ST. MICHAELS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL 63 (OT)
LANGLEY — Jordyn Nohr knows her way around the historical section of the annual B.C. girls basketball championship program.
And the Grade 9 guard with Langley’s top-seeded Brookswood Bobcats, who on Saturday added yet another MVP trophy to place up on the family mantle following her team’s 69-63 overtime win over the No. 2-seeded St. Michael’s University School Blue Jags of Victoria in the B.C. Triple-A final, isn’t shy to admit that she and her teammates have some pretty lofty ambitions.
“I want to bring it back,” Nohr said of the dynasty-like runs made earlier this century under former head coaches Scott Reeves and Neil Brown.
“I think we have the group to do it, especially with next year only losing two seniors,” she continued after, what by her already-incredible standards, was a luke warm first-half start in which the Bobcats built a 12-point (21-9) lead, then watched as it evaporated into a 12-point (35-23) deficit, that 24-point first-half swing doing much to suggest that the team and it’s ninth-grade core were just not ready to compete against a Blue Jags team making its second straight trip to the championship game.
The second half, however, told a much different story as the very questions one might have about a team whose core is built around it’s three Grade 9 starters (Nohr, Ashley Vande Ven, Emma Lenhoff) were fully and completely laid to rest, especially under the conditions in which they persevered to win.
A game that started as a contest of extreme runs finally settled down into a test of punch and counter-punch with Nohr (20 points, nine rebounds, nine assists) and 6-foot-2 centre Vande Ven (22 points, 11-of-14 shooting, 24 rebounds, nine blocks) each charting triple-double territory for the Bobcats, while SMUS Grade 11 point guard Avery Geddes scored nine of her team-high 21 points over the final seven minutes of the fourth quarter.
The Blue Jags forced overtime when senior guard Alex Motherwell hit a pair of free throws with 5.3 seconds remaining.
In the extra frame, however, Nohr set the stage early with, what for her, promises to be a career-defining ‘remember when’ moment.
Twenty-five seconds into OT, off a fast-break, Nohr, on the dead run, threw a perfect seeing-eye pass behind her back right into the pocket of senior teammate Bryn Symons, and the latter, playing in the final game of her high school career, made the lay-in for a 60-58 lead.
St. Michaels University School never led in the overtime, and afterwards, as Nohr held court in her own media scrum, the growing comfort she is feeling in fielding questions from reporters is an indication that she is not one to shrink wherever the spotlights gets bright.
“I was going up (the court) and really wanted to do it and I saw the opportunity and I was really hoping that she’d make the lay up,” Nohr said of Symons. “I’ve done it a few times before and it’s one of my favourites because it makes the fans go crazy,”
Saturday’s Brookswood win also hammered home another point, and it’s one which plays perfectly to Nohr’s thought that the Bobcats are indeed ready to make the pinnacle of March Madness a repeatable goal.
As Nohr has matured and adapted seamlessly to senior varsity basketball, so too have her younger teammates.
“It was like when Jordyn was getting double-teammed, it’s all the other girls that are contributing,” said her mom, head coach Chrissy Nohr. “We had so many kids score tonight and that was really good.”
Topping that list was Vande Ven.
Playing in a position where strength is as important as length, the Grade 9 forward/post admitted afterwards that she had a clear mandate heading into the game.
“I was really focussing on the defensive end, trying to have good help-side with my teammates and play that role tonight,” she explained, professing no knowledge of her stat-sheeting stuffing ways which saw her fall one block shy of a triple-double with 22 points and 24 rebounds, including seven offensive rebounds.
Head coach Nohr put it more succinctly: “(Her presence) was huge for us today. Her job was to stay in the key. She was not to leave the key and that is what she did today.”
SMUS head coach Lindsay Brooke admitted that Vande Ven posed a lot of problems.
“It’s her length,” Brooke said. “She is so smart for a Grade 9 kid. They did a lot of nice action against us to get easy baskets. She finishes. She changed a lot of shots and she had a ton of blocks.”
The Blue Jags were right there to take the championship Saturday and played with the requisite resilience throughout, despite the fact they were coming into their biggest game of the season a day after edging South Kamloops 55-54 by hitting the winning free throw in the final two seconds of play.
That game also featured some big runs by both teams and as Brooke suggested, having to make huge rallies in back-to-back games in the Final Four is not the ideal way to try and win a championship.
The Blue Jags also got 19 points from Grade 11 guard Charlie Anderson.
Symons was excellent for the Bobcats with 17 points.
And getting back to that talk of Brookswood dynasties of the past, the Bobcats won three straight from 2004-06 under head coach Scott Reeves with MVPs like Candace Morisset and Kelsey Adrian.
They also won three straight under head coach Neil Brown from 2014-16, all three of which sawAislinn Konig picked the tournament MVP.
Both of Brookswood’s threepeats came in the top-tiered title games.
“I watched her when I was little,” Nohr said of Konig, moments after she had won her own first senior MVP
title. “She was an amazing player and we want to bring that legacy back to Brookswood.”
If you’re reading this story or viewing these photos on any website other than one belonging to a university athletic department, it has been taken without appropriate permission. In these challenging times, true journalism will survive only through your dedicated support and loyalty. VarsityLetters.ca and all of its exclusive content has been created to serve B.C.’s high school and university sports community with hard work, integrity and respect. Feel free to drop us a line any time at howardtsumura@gmail.com.
