Morgan senior Mersades Passante, who was named the conference Player of the Year prior to the contest, scored a game-high 20 points.
NORTH BRANFORD - The Morgan girls basketball team is no stranger to the Shoreline Conference championship game, but having lost four of the last six tournament finals, including the past two years, the Huskies were just hoping for better results. That's what they got Wednesday.
Scoring the game's first 17 points, top-seeded Morgan took out its frustrations early and cruised to a 66-38 victory over No. 2 North Branford in the conference championship at North Branford High School.
The Shoreline title was the first for Morgan since defeating Cromwell in overtime in 2015.
"That's how we felt," Morgan coach Caitlin Woods said after her team improved to 21-2. "It's been four times that we've gone to the Shoreline championship. We have played some really tough teams. We battled, but tonight, I had a good feeling. My kids let it all out there the first two quarters, and then there was no looking back from there."
The Huskies did not need overtime in this contest as they led 17-0 through the first seven minutes of the game. North Branford did not record its first points until 52 seconds remained in the opening quarter, on a bucket by Emma Preiss.
The combination of Morgan's pressure defense and a balanced scoring attack proved to be too much for North Branford to handle.
"I do think the environment was a shell-shock to my girls," North Branford coach Sabrina LeMere said after her team fell to 16-7. "I think being in this situation, it was amazing. I think they were so pumped going on to the floor in the beginning of the game, it really threw them for a loop.
"Morgan is a great team. They work hard. Their 25 and 10, Emma (Teuner) and Sadie (Passante), their two core players, know how to play basketball. It was hard for us to stop them."
Morgan senior Mersades (Sadie) Passante, who was named the conference Player of the Year prior to the contest, lived up to the honor with 11 points in the opening quarter and a game-high 20 overall.
Passante scored six straight points for an 8-0 lead, and Morgan, also the Shoreline runners-up in 2020 and 2021, extended its leads to 12-0 and 19-2.
"It was a lot of motivation," Passante said. "We know how it felt last year, and it was our goal since the beginning of the year to get here. We knew we were going to put everything on the line to get the victory.
"It was huge. That was all of our momentum. We just felt so much confidence in that moment, and it let us get the energy to keep going."
While Passante was doing her part, so too were juniors Madeleine Grenon and Emma Teuner. The trio combined for the team's first 51 points until Emma Holecz scored in the third quarter for a 53-28 lead.
Teuner scored eight points in the second quarter and 12 points in the first half, before finishing with 19. Teuner scored Morgan's first six points of the second quarter to give her team a 26-7 lead.
"We just came out calm," Teuner said. "That was our main goal tonight. We have been here before. We were a little bit worried about being in their gym, but we just put that to the side, and we played basketball the way we always do."
It was Teuner's basket for the 26-7 lead which epitomized the first half, as Morgan won all the battles for loose balls and scored after a handful of attempts.
"It is a collective effort," Woods said. "What's so terrific about these kids is they play that hard for four quarters, and they don't get a whole lot of time off. This is a tremendous team to coach. I am really proud of them."
Grenon was not to be outdone as she knocked down three 3-pointers, had 14 points in the first half and finished with 19 in the win. Grenon's first 3-pointer and a field goal gave Morgan a 17-0 lead.
When Grenon hit from inside, then drained a 3-pointer as part of an 11-0 run with 3:35 left in the first half, Morgan had a 31-7 lead.
The Thunderbirds got as close as 18 points on a 3-pointer by Ella Chasanoff with 4:36 remaining in the game, but Morgan ran off the next nine points to end any thoughts of a comeback.
Preiss led North Branford with 12 points, while Skylar Gage added 10 and Chasanoff scored nine. Zoe Desimone rounded out North Branford's scoring with seven points.
Morgan is seeded No. 1 in the upcoming Division IV tournament, and will host the winner of Naugatuck and Woodland in the second round March 10. North Branford is No. 7 in Division V and will host Goodwin Tech on Friday in the first round.
Players of the Game
Mersades Passante, Madeleine Grenon and Emma Teuner: The Morgan trio combined for 58 of the team's 66 points, including the team's first 51 points of the game.
Quotable
"This team has just been like that every single year since I have been here. The culture has just been growing and growing. Every senior that has graduated has been a huge part of that. This year, we finally took it for them and for us." - Morgan's Emma Teuner on winning the Shoreline title.
Morgan 66, North Branford 38
NORTH BRANFORD 4 10 14 10-38
MORGAN 20 19 14 13-66
North Branford: Emma Preiss 5 0 2-3 12, Ella Chasanoff 3 1 0-0 9, Skylar Gage 2 2 0-0 10, Zoe Desimone 1 0 5-6 7, Siena Podzikowski 0 0 0-0 0. Totals:
Morgan: Emma Teuner 8 0 3-4 19, Mersades Passante 7 0 6-8 20, Madeleine Grenon 5 3 0-0 19, Emma Holecz 1 0 0-0 2, Addison Reed 1 0 0-0 2, Nora Winsor 1 0 0-0 2, Emerson Dunning 1 0 0-0 2. Totals: 24 3 9-12 66.
Team records: North Branford 16-7, Morgan 21-2.
This article originally published at Morgan rolls past North Branford for 1st Shoreline girls basketball championship in 11 years.
Category: General Sports
