Girls basketball: Watchung Hills no longer taking anyone by surprise
Simeon PincusLast season could not have started worse for the Watchung Hills High School girls basketball team.
After a disappointing 2015-16 campaign, the Warriors entered last year humbled but hopeful, despite only one senior in the regular rotation in Emma Zucker and several freshmen expected to support Princeton-bound Julia Cunningham, a then-three-year starter who gave the Warriors a legitimate star to build around.
But after an opening-night loss to Bridgewater-Raritan, a game Watchung Hills led by 10 points, a setback compounded by the loss of Zucker to a season-ending knee injury, things looked pretty bleak, and its opponents knew it. So when the young, inexperienced Warriors dusted themselves off, shook off their unfortunate circumstances and reeled off 21 victories in their next 24 games, their fellow Skyland Conference clubs weren’t quite expecting the surge.
This year, with all but one starter back, with Cunningham reaching her senior season, and the young breakout players of a year ago now having a season of varsity under their belts, another big-time season isn’t going to take anyone by surprise.
“We’re still a relatively young squad, but, obviously, our expectations are high, and we’re working hard trying to meet them,” said Watchung Hills coach Reese Kirchofer, whose team finished 21-5, won the Skyland Conference Raritan Division title and made a surprising run to the Somerset County Tournament semifinals, before its season came to a disappointing end when it was upset by Bridgewater-Raritan at home in the North 2 Group IV quarterfinals.
“We’re looking to build off the fact that kids that are back now in the gym now have a little bit of experience. At a young age, they were tested at a pretty high level in some pretty high-level games, which has to battle test them a little bit. So we hope to be more confident in those situations. Our chemistry was fantastic last year, so another year has to add to that, we would think.
"We have kids that have really worked well together in the past, so there’s no reason they shouldn’t work well together again, we hope.”
“This year we have higher expectations for ourselves,” Cunningham said. “Coming into last year, having a really young team and then doing so well, is awesome, but the next year you come back and you kind of have a target on your back and everybody wants to beat you. So that’s kind of tough. But this year, with a year of playing a lot of games together under our belt, I think that’s really going to help us moving forward. And having the other players being more confident, even with just another year of varsity experience, helps. It’s already helped. Even since tryouts and now through the first few scrimmages, we’ve just been playing really well, moving the ball well, running the floor. It looks good.”
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Cunningham is certainly the catalyst, having burst onto the scene as a freshman, scoring 13.7 points per game and earning a third-team All-Area selection. After tallying 13.2 points and 6.2 rebounds per game as a sophomore, Cunningham took it up another notch last year, posting 21.7 points and 7.2 rebounds, becoming the school’s all-time scoring leader.
But she didn’t do it alone last year, nor does she expect to again this year. Although Jess Santo decided not to come out for her senior season after averaging 8.8 points and six rebounds per game last year, the rest of the club is returning. That includes sophomores Jayden Baltuch, who notched 8.1 points per game last season, and Lex Santo, who added 7.8 points per contest, and the rookies’ surprising impact certainly put Watchung Hills over the top.
Senior co-captain Alyssa Killeen is also key among returners, averaging over five points and rebounds per contest last year, giving the Warriors four returning starters. The return of 5-foot-9 junior McKenna Frey should also help, giving the team an inside presence.
But while Watchung Hills has more experience, overall, it is still pretty young, especially when you add four incoming sophomores to the mix, including Mahogany Jenkins, who should have an immediate impact.
“It’s pretty much the same,” Cunningham said. “One year of varsity certainly helps, but they’re still young. Starting two sophomores, it’s really just me and (senior co-captain) Alyssa (Killeen) at the helm of things. And as captains, she's done a really good job of getting the team to come together and take a little bit of the weight off my shoulders.
"But basketball-wise, it’s really just the same as last year. I think the younger girls are going to do a better job of being confident in themselves and knowing their roles than they were last year coming into a new team with new players.”
Of course, having a player of Cunningham’s stature helps matters. It has for the past three years and it will against this season. In addition to her incredible talent on the court, Kirchofer said Cunningham is like having another coach on the staff, and her impact on players around her is immeasurable.
“I’ve said since Day 1, even when she was a freshman, that she was able to make other players better,” Kirchofer said. “She still does that. Even last year, her numbers were spectacular up and down and she fills every stat line you can have, but yet, at the same time, she creates for other people, gets other people the looks they need, and pushes them when they need to be pushed. We only have two seniors and two juniors, and the rest of our kids are all sophomores, and to have that type of leadership on the floor, that really pays big dividends in getting everyone else to work. She’s at such a high level and her effort is at such a high level, you can’t not at least try and be the best you can when you’re in there with her.”
But it’s about more than just what she’s done on the court. Watchung Hills had not had a winning campaign in four years before Cunningham arrived, and won just six times the season before she moved up to high school, so her impact has gone far beyond her stat lines.
“She came in the same time as I came in, and it’s really nice to establish your culture and have a kid buy into it and represent it the way she has,” said her fourth-year head coach. “I have a great debt of gratitude to her for the way she’s handled herself. Over the years, she’s matured as a player and a leader, although she’s had the great talent the whole time, but I can’t say enough about her abilities as student-athlete, community member, and the way she reacts to other kids in school. I’ve seen that develop and I’m really proud of her for that, and I think to have her be the face of our team, I couldn’t think of anyone better. She’s done so many things for our program and we’re lucky to have her.”
Cunningham accepts the responsibility of not only being a senior and her team’s best player, as well as being the face of the program. But like every great athlete, she has goals, and just as she knows she can’t reach those goals without the help of her teammates, it’s also important to her to be able to return the favor.
“We’re in a tough (state) group and a tough county, but I want to be in the county final this year and go far in the state tournament,” Cunningham said. “The past few years, we’ve had little slip ups and times when we haven’t been able to score in big games, and this year it seems like it’s all coming together really well. So I’m really excited to see how we do toward the end of the season. And that’s a big thing for me, personally. Leaving behind some sort of legacy for the younger players so that the next few years are just as exciting for them.”
Simeon Pincus can be reached at CNGirlsHoops@aol.com. Follow him on Twitter @SimeonPincus and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/SimeonPincusCN
