VERONA - Evidence of Jamie Armstrong's value to the Cheesemakers was never more glaring than in the final dozen minutes of Saturday's 42-32 victory over Dodgeville in a WIAA Divison 2 regional final grudge match.
Whereas the Monroe sophomore is still hampered by her high right ankle sprain, she was crippled by foul trouble throughout the first 20 minutes before scoring all 10 of her points in the last three minutes of the game.
And she did it by forgetting the rough spots. That is, the short-term ones.
"I just forgot everything," Armstrong said. "We wanted this so bad, to get revenge from last year."
Last year, the Dodgers handed Monroe a season-ending 40-30 upset loss on the very same hardwood.
Saturday, Armstrong wasted no time making an impact after tapping her feet nervously on the bench throughout the second quarter and, even more so, after she picked up a quick foul just 35 seconds into the third.
Twenty seconds after rejoining the action with 4:04 left in the third, Armstrong tumbled and rolled out of bounds after vying for an offensive rebound. As cries of "Come on Jamie!" spilled down from Monroe's student section, Armstrong sprung to her feet and ran the 94 feet before grabbing a rebound and triggering an offensive set capped by a Kyleigh Sellnow 3-pointer from left of the top of the key that seized a 26-18 lead.
But after Monroe point guard Gwen Sutter hit a two, her Dodgers counterpart, senior Chelci Reynolds, hit one of her own before rattling home a 3-point, buzzer-beating heave from just inside the half-court circle to chop the lead to 28-23 going into the fourth.
"When she hit a shot like that after you haven't scored much all quarter, all I could do was laugh," Dodgers coach Josh Busch said. "That could've been something that swung the game, but give Monroe credit that they didn't let it bug 'em."
"I was worried about that, but we just challenged our kids and asked them how bad they wanted it," Monroe coach Kevin Keen said. "They remember last year; all but two of them were here. We really didn't need to fire them up, they fired up themselves."
Perhaps Keen's club was a bit too jacked up as it missed its first five free throws of the decisive quarter but still built a 34-25 lead with two-and-a-half minutes to play as Armstrong scored back-to-back improbable buckets.
She first corralled a baseline inbounds lob from Sellnow a few feet in front of the rim and somehow flung the ball as she fell away from Bridget Beerkircher's straight-up stance. The ball touched every part of the rim and fell and, just 20 seconds later after a Dodgers hoop, Armstrong took a lob from fellow 6-foot forward Ashley Hermanson and absorbed tons of contact from Beerkircher and Ann Tank but muscled a shot that barely spun its way up over the cylinder before falling through.
"Luck," Armstrong said. "I was just so frustrated at that point and all of it came out at once."
After missing two free throws in the first, Armstrong hit her last four down the stretch, and the Cheesemakers made right what went wrong a year ago.
"The last week all we talked about was not letting it happen again and it got us fired up," Sellnow said.
"This is the biggest game that we've ever played in," Monroe senior Calyn Bidlingmaier said.
Hermanson singlehandedly kept the Cheese in control after a 5-5 first quarter as she scored eight of her 14 in the second to take an 18-12 lead into the locker room.
"We were trying to decide whether or not we wanted to risk putting Jamie out there and getting a third (foul), but Morgan (Kennison) did a good job stepping in and Ashley had a big quarter," Keen said. "In a low-scoring ballgames, Ashley's done a great job of taking advantage of what few scoring opportunities she gets."
She also showed off her improvisational skills early in the third as she tapped an inbounds from Sellnow from the right block back over to the left and just over the fingertips of a double team before putting the zero-footer home.
"That was just spur of the moment, I didn't know what I was doing," Hermanson said.
Monroe hopes to be just as unconscious when they follow in the boys' footsteps by traveling to Waunakee Thursday for a sectional semifinal with Reedsburg, which upset the state's top-ranked club in Richland Center.
Lake Mills takes on Delavan-Darien in the other sectional semifinal.
Whereas the Monroe sophomore is still hampered by her high right ankle sprain, she was crippled by foul trouble throughout the first 20 minutes before scoring all 10 of her points in the last three minutes of the game.
And she did it by forgetting the rough spots. That is, the short-term ones.
"I just forgot everything," Armstrong said. "We wanted this so bad, to get revenge from last year."
Last year, the Dodgers handed Monroe a season-ending 40-30 upset loss on the very same hardwood.
Saturday, Armstrong wasted no time making an impact after tapping her feet nervously on the bench throughout the second quarter and, even more so, after she picked up a quick foul just 35 seconds into the third.
Twenty seconds after rejoining the action with 4:04 left in the third, Armstrong tumbled and rolled out of bounds after vying for an offensive rebound. As cries of "Come on Jamie!" spilled down from Monroe's student section, Armstrong sprung to her feet and ran the 94 feet before grabbing a rebound and triggering an offensive set capped by a Kyleigh Sellnow 3-pointer from left of the top of the key that seized a 26-18 lead.
But after Monroe point guard Gwen Sutter hit a two, her Dodgers counterpart, senior Chelci Reynolds, hit one of her own before rattling home a 3-point, buzzer-beating heave from just inside the half-court circle to chop the lead to 28-23 going into the fourth.
"When she hit a shot like that after you haven't scored much all quarter, all I could do was laugh," Dodgers coach Josh Busch said. "That could've been something that swung the game, but give Monroe credit that they didn't let it bug 'em."
"I was worried about that, but we just challenged our kids and asked them how bad they wanted it," Monroe coach Kevin Keen said. "They remember last year; all but two of them were here. We really didn't need to fire them up, they fired up themselves."
Perhaps Keen's club was a bit too jacked up as it missed its first five free throws of the decisive quarter but still built a 34-25 lead with two-and-a-half minutes to play as Armstrong scored back-to-back improbable buckets.
She first corralled a baseline inbounds lob from Sellnow a few feet in front of the rim and somehow flung the ball as she fell away from Bridget Beerkircher's straight-up stance. The ball touched every part of the rim and fell and, just 20 seconds later after a Dodgers hoop, Armstrong took a lob from fellow 6-foot forward Ashley Hermanson and absorbed tons of contact from Beerkircher and Ann Tank but muscled a shot that barely spun its way up over the cylinder before falling through.
"Luck," Armstrong said. "I was just so frustrated at that point and all of it came out at once."
After missing two free throws in the first, Armstrong hit her last four down the stretch, and the Cheesemakers made right what went wrong a year ago.
"The last week all we talked about was not letting it happen again and it got us fired up," Sellnow said.
"This is the biggest game that we've ever played in," Monroe senior Calyn Bidlingmaier said.
Hermanson singlehandedly kept the Cheese in control after a 5-5 first quarter as she scored eight of her 14 in the second to take an 18-12 lead into the locker room.
"We were trying to decide whether or not we wanted to risk putting Jamie out there and getting a third (foul), but Morgan (Kennison) did a good job stepping in and Ashley had a big quarter," Keen said. "In a low-scoring ballgames, Ashley's done a great job of taking advantage of what few scoring opportunities she gets."
She also showed off her improvisational skills early in the third as she tapped an inbounds from Sellnow from the right block back over to the left and just over the fingertips of a double team before putting the zero-footer home.
"That was just spur of the moment, I didn't know what I was doing," Hermanson said.
Monroe hopes to be just as unconscious when they follow in the boys' footsteps by traveling to Waunakee Thursday for a sectional semifinal with Reedsburg, which upset the state's top-ranked club in Richland Center.
Lake Mills takes on Delavan-Darien in the other sectional semifinal.
