Jackson Memorial High School’s Tiffany Montagne (32) goes up for a shot during the Jaguars’ 50-47 win over North Hunterdon High School in the NJSIAA Group IV state championship game on March 11. Montagne scored 11 points and contributed eight assists to the Jaguars’ winning effort. The game was played at the Pine Belt Arena, Toms River. LAUREN CASSELBERRY Sinking three-pointers is typical for Hannah Missry, who makes about 3.5 threepoint field goals per game for the Jackson Memorial High School girls basketball team.
Missry’s 107th three-point field goal of the 2011-12 season was her most important, though, because it came with :11 left in the fourth quarter and lifted the Jaguars to a 50- 47 victory over North Hunterdon High School in the NJSIAAGroup IV state championship game on March 11 at the Pine Belt Arena in Toms River.
North Hunterdon’s long-distance shot at the buzzer had no suspense as it was well off the mark.
Missry scored 27 points and shot 8-11 from three-point range in the Group IV title game. Jackson Memorial (27-5), which had advanced in the tournament by winning its first Central Jersey Group IV state sectional title, blunted North Hunterdon (27-6) as the Lions sought their second state title in three years.
“After I shot it, Iwas just thinking of dropping back on defense and I thought, What did I just do?,” Missry said of her winning threepointer. “Then I realized we were up by three, and thought, OK, wow!”
“Iwould notwant anyone else to take that shot,” Jackson Memorial’s Stephanie Mason said of her teammate.
The victory kept the Jaguars’ season alive and sent them into the NJSIAA Tournament of Champions. The Tournament of Champions features the four public school champions (Group, I, II, III and IV) and two non-public school champions.
Jackson Memorial played the Gill St. Bernards School of Gladstone in a Tournament of Champions first-round game on March 13. Gill St. Bernards won the Non- Public B state championship.
Against North Hunterdon in the Group IV final, Jackson Memorial took 25 three-point shots and made 11. Meanwhile, North Hunterdon shot 4-16 from beyond the arc.
Missry connected from all over the floor on her three-point field goals, including the game-winner from the left side after North Hunterdon twice tied the score down the stretch and took its only lead at 41-40 with 5:21 left onAlicea Foran’s baseline drive.
Foran’s basket completed a comeback from Jackson Memorial’s 20-4 first-quarter lead. Missry dropped in four of the Jaguars’ six three-pointers in that game-opening burst.
Shannon Evans answered Foran’s basket with a layup for a 42-41 lead, and Jackson Memorial never trailed again.
“Nothing can stop her when she gets going,” Evans said of Missry. Jackson Memorial coach Rachel Goodale said she had no thought of calling a timeout in the closing seconds of the game with the score tied 47-47.
“Sometimes when we call a timeout, they freeze and think too much,” Goodale said. “I figured that with the personnel I have, let them play. They’ll grind it out.”
The Jaguars could have made things easier on themselves, but they struggled from the foul line against the Lions, going 5-15.
“It’s crazy. In our state games against Rancocas Valley we shot 13-14 and against Washington Township we went 9-9. This late inMarch, legs are tired. You have to make an adjustment and play through fatigue, and we did not do a good job of that,” Goodale said. “We’ll be concentrating on that. Your form [at the free throw line] is a little bit different if your legs are tired.”
“It feels amazing. We worked so hard on this, day in and day out,” said Jaguar guard Tiffany Montagne, who scored 11 points and had eight assists and put the clamps on highscoring Jessica Pellechio for most of the game. Pellechio finished with 13 points for the Lions.
Forward Alison Tarsi led North Hunterdon with 17 points before fouling out with 1:13 to play.
Defense has been the hallmark of Jackson Memorial’s success this season, and it set the tone early as the Jaguars held North Hunterdon to 1-8 shooting while Missry’s longrange success forced North Hunterdon out of its 2-3 zone and into a man-to-man defense.
“A lot of times we have not had a good first quarter, and I felt we needed that, so I figured I would step up and they would follow my lead,” Missry said.
“We were lucky to shoot this well, but if we can defend, we are going to be fine,” Goodale said. “We are going to make our shots sometime, if not in the first quarter, and we happened to hit early. It opened up their zone a little.”
North Hunterdon had size with a pair of 6-foot post players, and two starters and a sixth man back from its 2010 state championship team, but the Jaguars found a way to win when it counted most.
What helped Jackson Memorial was a good passing game that found open players through much of the first half until North Hunterdon tightened its defense even more.
“Our season prepared us to know how to win games down the stretch,” Goodale said.
Evans said she felt the victory that convinced her the team would play deep into the state tournament was the Jaguars’ 80-70 win over Manalapan early in the Central Jersey Group IV state sectional tournament.
“That’s when I thought we could go far,” Evans said.
A few weeks before the state sectional tournament began, Manalapan, which was a .500 team, upset the Jaguars.
“Everyone doubted we could get this far,” Missry said. “The only ones who believed it were ourselves and our coach.”
Now, the Jaguars have a lot of company.