Long Beach Pyramid Is Nicole’s Greathouse

When your best player’s name is Greathouse, what else would you expect but greatness?

With 13 points in the second half and two blocked shots in the final 90 seconds, Nicole Greathouse lifted the Buena High girls’ basketball team to a 56-51 victory over top-seeded Mater Dei to capture the Southern Section Division I-A championship Friday night at the Pyramid.

Greathouse, a junior center, had 23 points, 14 rebounds and five blocked shots as the second-seeded Bulldogs (28-1) overcame a 13-point second-quarter deficit.

“This is wonderful,” Greathouse said. “We kept our composure. We proved everybody wrong.”

When senior guard Eboni Conley was lost for the season because of a knee injury Feb. 1, Greathouse said, few expected the Bulldogs would win the section title or earn a rematch with Mater Dei, which beat Buena, 57-53, for the 1995 championship.

It looked as if Buena would fall short when it trailed, 27-14, amid a 12-2 Monarch run in the second quarter. Buena closed the margin to 29-21 at halftime, when Coach Joe Vaughan cornered Greathouse in the locker room.

“Mr. Vaughan told me I needed to step up and show leadership and responsibility,” she said.

Greathouse, who missed four layups in the first quarter, responded.

Scoring seven points in the third quarter, the 6-foot-1 post player led Buena on a 15-3 third-quarter run in which the Bulldogs took the lead for the first time, 38-37.

Mater Dei (25-3) regained the lead, 44-40, at the end of the quarter.

But Buena went ahead for good, 48-46, after Ashley Jackson scored off her own steal and Renae Hofmann made a three-point shot from the wing.

When Mater Dei tried to rally, Greathouse stood in the way, blocking a three-point attempt by Lori Hurlbut and a layup by Melody Peterson on back-to-back possessions in the closing moments.

Within the final 13 seconds, Greathouse and Kori Sebek sealed the victory by making four consecutive free throws. The victory gave Vaughan his fifth section championship in Buena’s 11 appearances in section finals.

“Things weren’t going that bad in the first half,” Vaughan said. “I felt we just needed to step the defense a little bit and take away their drives.”

Stephanie Kinnear had 10 points and 10 rebounds for Buena, which survived 17 turnovers and shot only 37.3%.

But Buena did clamp down on defense, holding Peterson to seven points, 11 under her average, and forward Ronnie Gondringer to 10 points, seven under hers.