Emelia Miller’s 3-point try from the right corner was beautiful. It had the kind of perfect shooter’s spin Steph Curry puts on ‘em. Emelia’s try was not an important shot in any way except in every way. The game was a rout when Emelia’s beauty went up. Goes in, great. Doesn’t go in, great.

Great either way, for on this night, every Potter had a hand in that shot. Every Potter on the bench rose up to see it. They wanted it for Emelia, a senior who maybe has scored once this season, who plays only briefly, who may be the 9th player in sometimes, or maybe she’s the 12th, but who’s counting?

Somehow, and don’t ask me how, but somehow, and I know it to be true, because, hey, I was a young man when I started watching these Lady Potters teams, a very young man, and now I’m a great-grandfather (twice), and I know this to be true. Somehow, from the stars to the 9th, 10th, 15th girl on the bench, they all believe in the sisterhood of Potters.

So when Emelia’s 3-pointer was in the air, even a great-grandfather rooted for that beauty to go in, just to hear the roof-raising racket the other Potters leaping in celebration would create. Yes, there’ll be a time for an Emelia Miller 3, but the time was not tonight, not that it mattered, for on this night, Emelia’s mother, Rachel, stood at midcourt afterwards, tears in her eyes, a stone in her hands.

The stone was carved by the grandfather of Emelia’s teammates, Ellie and Abby VanMennen. You see the picture here. You see Rachel smiling through her tears. Her husband, Emelia’s father, died a summer ago, 49 years old, cancer, and the grief is still in her. The Potters players, on their own, raised money for the Illinois Cancer Fund. Tonight they warmed up in green T-shirts bearing the legend, “TEAM MILLER.”

Holding the stone, Rachel Miller said, “The girls really supported Emelia through this.” She stopped to breathe. “They really are Emelia’s rock.”

Emelia, there by her mother, was all smiles.

Such a night it was.

She said, “I have the best teammates in the world.”

I have a rule of sportswriting. If the game is really not much of a game, find something else to say. And if the something else turns out to be a rock, write about the rock, which is, after all, the perfect symbol for what Magda Lopko said about the night. Magda Lopko is a senior, maybe 8th on the bench some nights, and she said the team had wanted to acknowledge the Millers’ loss last season. But it was too soon.

So they waited for tonight. “Winning is fun,” Lopko said. “But getting your sisters together is the best part of all.”

The basketball. Oh, yes, The basketball. “A tale of two halves,” the coach, Bob Becker, said, proving he was once an aspiring sportswriter. First half, Morton’s motion offense was mostly wasted motion, with lots of cutting and almost no passing. The Potters led at halftime, 19-15, and a great-grandfather, for one, thought of the nap he had missed earlier that day.

It was 26-20 when the Potters woke up. In the next minute and one second, they went on a 9-0 run: a Paige Selke 3, a three-point drive by Izzy Hutchinson, and an Anja Ruxlow 3 from the left corner that caused Becker to fist-bump assistant coach Dakota Neisen in celebration of, at last, a play that worked the way it was drawn up.

From there, no contest. The lead grew to 51-27 in exactly 8 minutes.

“We had good energy tonight, on the court and on the bench,” senior captain Addy Engel said. “We’re in a good spot now.”

Morton now begins a stretch of five games against undistinguished teams. Becker said. “We want to win out going into the State Farm tournament.” That tournament begins Dec. 27.

Morton is now 6-3, 2-0 in Mid-Illini play. Metamora is 2-7, 0-2.

Hutchinson and Engel led the Potters’ scoring with 13 apiece. Ellie VanMeenen and Ruxlow had 10 each, Selke and Payton Hays 5 each.