Westminster Lady Wildcats Basketball Team Reaches End Of The Road

When the girls basketball team walked into the locker room at Mizzou Arena following their loss in the 2010 Missouri Class 4 third-place game last March 13, the Lady Crusaders made one collective promise to each other.

That they would get back to the Final Four in 2011.

Saturday afternoon, at Lindenwood University’s Hyland Arena, St. Dominic got its chance to fulfill that promise, and the Lady Crusaders convincingly do so, with a 60-47 state quarterfinal round win over upstart .

"We're thrilled, and the girls are thrilled," St. Dominic coach Suzie Mennemeier said. "But after we got done celebrating, we said our goal's not done yet. We're almost there, but we still have two games to play."

The Lady Crusaders will face St. Francis Borgia High in the state semifinals on Thursday, March 10, at Mizzou Arena in Columbia. Tip-off is set for at 8:30 p.m.

St. Dominic led 12-8 after the first quarter, but opened the second with a 10-4 run to build a 10-point lead.

Westminster tried to stay close, and pulled to within 22-17, but St. Dominic closed the half with an 11-0 run to build a 33-17 lead at the intermission.

“It was mainly the match-ups,” Mennemeier said. “We didn’t know who they were going to put (Courtney Powell) on, or who they were going to put (Sadie Stipanovich) on. But once we saw who they were covering, we called our offense accordingly.

Senior point guard Jen Rocha was the catalyst for St. Dominic’s offense. She scored a game-high 17 points, and unofficially dished out eight assists to lead the Lady Crusader attack.

Junior teammate Kelly Schnieders had 15 points, and senior Leslie Wilmes added 10, as St. Dominic built its lead to as many as 23 points in the third quarter.

"They're a great team, and they're a lot quicker than I thought they would be," Westminster coach Steve Stipanovich said. "We knew we'd have to play well to win, and we didn't handle their pressure very well. We've actually been doing pretty well at that the last five or six weeks, but the better team won tonight, and it's as simple as that.”

Sophomore center Sadie Stipanovich led Westminster with 16 points, as the Lady Wildcats finished the year with 19-8 record and a district championship, after finishing third in the MWAA Red Conference this season.

“This was a good year for us, especially the last six, seven weeks, we really came on strong,” Stipanovich said. “We made great strides. We started down low, but we finished a lot better than where we started. We believe we have a bright future.”

St. Dominic’s future and destiny will be staring them right in the face this weekend in Columbia. And Mennemeier believes her team will be ready to stare it right back down.

“We will concentrate on the next game,” Mennemeier said. “Whoever the next opponent is, that’s who we focus on, and that next game is Thursday.”