Morton’s Lady Potters 43, Richwoods 42

Used to, when she was a kid, she’d dribble the thing five times, spin it in her hands, and then get around to shooting the free throw. Now that she’s a freshman in high school, she’s done with all that adolescent showing-off stuff. Now Katie Krupa bounces it low once, picks it up, shoots the thing. “Muscle memory,” she said. “I went out with my dad yesterday and shot some free throws. I just needed to get some arc on it. As long as I get some arc, it’s good.”

So with 5.7 seconds to play today and Morton trailing by a point, Krupa found herself at the free throw line with a chance to win an important game.

Nervous much, on a scale of 1 to 10?

“Not really,” Krupa said. “A 4 maybe.”

Bounce, catch, shoot, nice arc. Game tied.

Bounce, catch, shoot, beautiful arc. Morton up, 43-42.

In the last seconds, Richwoods managed only an out-of-control shot that had no chance of going in. And Morton not only had won the third-place game in the State Farm Holiday Classic, it had, for the moment, anyway, exorcised the demon that is Richwoods. Three times in a row, including twice last season en route to a state championship that ended Morton’s three-year run, Richwoods had beaten Morton. The Richwoods people even talked out loud about going undefeated this season, a thing they could do, most likely, only if they beat Morton three more times. They won a double-overtime thriller at the Potterdome in November. Today, though, Morton restored order to the basketball universe.

Not that anyone will judge today’s game a masterpiece. Both teams came in after dispiriting semifinal losses last night. Whatever sleep the players got, it had to come quickly. Tip-off for this one was at noon. What could have been an electrifying championship game became a third-place game that was ordinary – until, in the last quarter, Morton teased its fans with a runaway and then left them breathless with a cliffhanging finale.

First the Potters built a 16-point lead with 7:22 to play. But Richwoods went on a 19-2 run that gave it the lead, 42-41, with only 29 seconds left. “I don’t know if ‘panic’ is the right word,” Bob Becker, the Morton coach, said, “but all of a sudden they’ve got the lead.”

After Tenley Dowell missed the front end of a bonus situation at :27.5, Richwoods returned the favor by giving up the ball on a traveling violation at :14.8. Coming upcourt under pressure, Dowell got the ball to Raquel Frakes left of the lane. Frakes moved toward the lane on a dribble and got the ball across the paint to Krupa on the low right block.

Krupa, the 6-foot freshman. Krupa, 15 years old, who all day long outplayed Richwoods’s senior first-team all-stater, the bigger, stronger Camryn Taylor, soon to play for Marquette University.

Taking Frakes’s pass, Krupa did what the good ones do. She went up to score, knowing she’d win the game there or be fouled with a chance to win it at the line. Going up, she was hammered across both arms by Taylor. Then came the two free throws with 5.7 seconds to play.

“Now we know for a fact that we can beat Richwoods,” Bob Becker said. “We just did it.”

After the game, I noticed Krupa had a small, rosy egg rising above her left eyebrow. “That bump, where’d it come from?”

“Camryn,” Krupa said.

“What’d she hit you with?”

“Elbow.”

Said casually. An elbow. Of course an elbow. No saints in the pivot. Said with a winner’s knowing smile.

The Potters’ 16-point lead was largely the result of a 14-0 run that covered the last half of the third quarter and a minute of the fourth. It began with a Dowell floater in the lane, followed by two Krupa buckets (one from 17 feet, the other at the rim). Dowell then came with a gliding attack and left-handed finish before Maddy Becker and Lindsey Dullard capped off the run with 3-pointers. The Potters led, 38-22 with 7:22 to play. From there on, the Potters hung on.

I loved two things most about this game: 1) Dowell was fabulous as the Potters point guard. “We came out with a lot of intensity,” the 6-foot senior said without noting that a large degree of that intensity emanated from her. If the Potters had the ball for, say, 20 minutes, it was in Dowell’s hands 19 minutes, every minute contested by Richwoods’ aggressive, body-bumping, hacking defenders. Dowell played the full 32 minutes and led Morton’s scoring with 17. And 2) a star was born. We knew Katie Krupa was good, the best freshman since Brandi Bisping. Today she showed us we have seen only the beginning. Twice today, once from 15 feet, once from 17, she made mid-range jump shots. I’d seen her shoot well from out there in practices, but those were her first two in a game. There will be more.

Krupa had 12 points today. (Taylor had 11.) Becker and Dullard had 6 apiece (all on 3’s), and Courtney Jones 2.