SACRAMENTO – Greatness doesn’t need introductions. You have it or you don’t. This season’s Archbishop Mitty girls basketball team had it.
The precision was apparent in December when the San Jose private school swept through an elite tournament in Arizona, beating the nation’s No. 1-ranked team in the process.
It continued through another high-profile showcase in Oregon a week later, then through league games and section and regional playoffs.
Nothing, it seemed, could stop this team.
Until Saturday night.
With a perfect season just 32 minutes away, Mitty fell flat. The Monarchs showed that they were human. The Open Division state championship that they have been chasing since the California Interscholastic Federation added the elite classification in 2013 slipped away amid turnovers, missed shots and superb play and coaching by their opponent.
Instead of Mitty celebrating at Golden 1 Center, it was Etiwanda hoisting the big trophy. The same team that beat Mitty in last season’s Open Division title game did it again.
And there was no sugarcoating the 60-48 defeat for Mitty.
Sue Philips, Mitty’s Hall of Fame coach, said during her postgame news conference that nobody on her team is happy about finishing second, that there are no moral victories.
“This is tough for this group,” she said. “Coming in with 30 wins and some remarkable victories along the way, to play the way we did tonight is incredibly disappointing. But I am also super proud of this group. Love these girls dearly. They were a blast to coach.”
Had Mitty defeated Etiwanda, it would have been the first unbeaten girls team to win the Open Division, which was created specifically for the state’s best teams, no matter a school’s enrollment.
But like Windward-Los Angeles in 2013 and a Miramonte team led by future WNBA superstar Sabrina Ionescu in 2016, which also brought perfect records to the Open Division state final, Mitty (30-1) didn’t leave Sacramento with the championship.
This season’s team also didn’t return home as the second under Phillips to go undefeated.
Twenty-five years ago, a Mitty team led by future McDonald’s All-American Rometra Craig – the daughter of former 49ers star running back Roger Craig – captured the Division I state championship to finish 31-0.
In those days, teams could opt to move up to the largest division to create a de facto Open Division. Some, like Mitty in 1999, did. Some did not.
In the Open Division era, Phillips has taken four teams to the state final in the top classification. Two lost heartbreakers. Two were soundly defeated.
This one stung not just because of the loss but how it unfolded and what preceded it.
Behind sophomore power forward McKenna Woliczko, a prolific scorer and rebounder, and University of Connecticut-bound McDonald’s All-American point guard Morgan Cheli, Mitty rolled through its competition in mind-blowing fashion.
The Monarchs entered the state final having played just one game all season decided by single digits and five decided by 20 points or fewer. They had scored 2,338 points and allowed 1,120 for an average margin of victory that was 40.6 points.
Not even a leg injury that sidelined Cheli for a month down the stretch slowed down this runaway group.
Until Etiwanda, a public school about 50 miles east of Los Angeles.
What happened?
“I’ll have to look back at it, but for whatever reason our mindset was not where it needed to be,” Phillips said. “I don’t think it was for a lack of effort or preparation. We got knocked on our heels and didn’t respond the way we expected.”
Phillips, whose program has captured six state crowns, was asked if the pressure to win an Open championship affected her team.
“Pressure? No,” she said. “We’ve won 16 NorCal titles. The question that should be asked is, ‘What are you guys doing to keep getting here?’ That’s the question that needs to be asked. We keep coming here. The fact we fell short, well, we fell short.
“We have to go back to the drawing board. But am I going to put my head in the sand? Heck no. I’m proud of sitting here with this group that had 30 wins.”
Phillips then noted some of this season’s team achievements, which were impressive. The Monarchs rose to No. 1 in the national rankings in December after beating the then-No. 1 team, Long Island Lutheran, at a high-profile tournament in Arizona. They also defeated top teams from Texas, Florida, Arizona, Oregon, Washington and even Canada.
Etiwanda lost to Long Island Lutheran by 20 in mid-January.
But the Southern California school learned from that loss and two others and survived a gauntlet of powerhouses from its region, including two games against 2019 and 2022 state Open champion Sierra Canyon, to return to Sacramento.
Conversely, Mitty had one competitive game – Folsom in the regional semifinals – since the holiday season.
“It keeps you focused,” Etiwanda coach Stan Delus said about his team’s schedule. “Losses are lessons that you can learn from, or tough ballgames. Being battle-tested always helps you in the toughest moments because you stay confident through the adversity. Being able to play in all these tough games that we did, in the CIF (section) championship, the regionals, it keeps you wanting more if you can overcome it.”
Etiwanda, which entered Saturday’s game ranked third nationally by ESPN, overcame the challenges.
And on the final night of the season, its star-studded roster that includes USC-bound McDonald’s All-American Kennedy Smith and electrifying point guard Aliyahna “Puff” Morris spoiled Mitty’s bid for perfection.