Mustang Girls Bball Off to Fantastic Start

With eight players returning from last year’s 16-11 squad, the girls basketball team had definite potential.

Would it translate into success?

The answer to that question so far is a resounding yes. The Mustangs improved to 5-0 by knocking off visiting Addison Trail 63-42 Tuesday night in the West Suburban Conference Gold Division opener for both teams.

Junior center Kirsten Zemke and senior guard/forward Sarrah Ludwig each scored 19 points, while senior forward Alison Dec added 13 points and six assists to lead Downers South, which won the Lyons Township Thanksgiving Tournament last week.

The hot start surprised the Mustangs, who graduated both of their starting guards but haven’t missed a beat.

“I was kind of surprised,” Ludwig said. “I knew we had potential but I didn’t know we were going to [have] a 5-0 start. I didn’t know that we were going to get it all together right away and just come out really strong in the beginning.

“We’re a really close group of girls so even if things aren’t going our way on the court we don’t get frustrated at each other. We always know how to put it together.”

The Mustangs did that from the get-go, opening the season with a 37-19 victory over Lyons.

“It was great,” Downers South Coach Ellen O’Brien said. “I think we kind of surprised LT, really shocked them and played some real good defense and executed a game plan.”

Downers South followed that with tournament wins over Queen of Peace (41-25), Oak Forest (48-39) and West Chicago (41-35).

“I thought it was going to be hard, but I always have faith in our team,” said Dec, a three-year starter. “We are the type of team that…always fights back. We never give up. We bring our intensity.”

The Mustangs trailed only once, 4-2, against Addison Trail (3-3, 0-1) and took a 35-27 halftime lead as Zemke, who was 7-of-8 from the floor and 3-of-3 from the free-throw line, tallied 14 of her points before intermission.

After Michelle Mitchell scored for South to open the third quarter, the Blazers scored on a basket by Joann Dinatale, prompting O’Brien to burn a timeout.

“Our intensity was a little low and we hadn’t played that well up to that point,” O’Brien said. “So I got a little upset with them.”

The lecture seemed to work, as the Mustangs reeled off the next nine points thanks to layups from Dec and Ludwig, a baseline jumper from Brittany Dietz and a three-point play by Zemke that was set up by a nifty feed from Dec. Downers South eventually extended the lead to 52-31 early in the fourth period.

“In the third quarter, we messed up on something,” Dec said. “[O’Brien] just yelled at us and said, ‘You guys have to pick it up.’ She was trying to fire us up and it worked.”

Ludwig, a talented all-around athlete who has a soccer scholarship to Valparaiso University, never needs firing up. Her intensity was evident from the start as she scored twice in transition after making steals in the first quarter. She finished with seven steals, five rebounds and three assists.

“Sarrah has always been able to do that,” O’Brien said. “She did that last year and she’s done a nice job for us. She’s a captain and a leader in this program.”

With two new starters in the backcourt in Mitchell and senior Katelyn Kubal, Ludwig’s aggressiveness is helping the Mustangs settle in at both ends of the court.

“Sarrah’s a great player,” Dec said. “I’ve been playing with her for a long, long time and we have good chemistry. I think this year, since she’s a senior, I feel like she thinks that she has to step up and she has more confidence in herself. She can do it. She can do anything she wants to and she’s a really aggressive player.”

The Mustangs are next in action Saturday when they host defending seven-time defending conference champion Proviso East at 7:30 p.m.