Qui’s huge second half leads Vintage past Napa in first Big Game
By Kyle Foster
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
The thing that separates basketball from other sports is that one player can put a team on their back and lead them to a victory.
In Friday night’s first Big Game girls basketball of the season, that’s what the Vintage girls’ basketball team got to beat Napa 43-41.
With the Crushers (3-3 overall, 3-3 Vine Valley Athletic League) trailing by eight, junior guard Lizzie Qui put the team on her back. She ran off 16 straight points to put Vintage back on top.
Qui ended the night with a game-high 25 points along with four rebounds.
“Well, I asked her to,” Vintage head coach Joe Donohoe explained. “Coaches are only as good as their best players.”
“Lizzie is a really phenomenal player. We knew that coming in,” Napa head coach Taylor Willis pointed out.
Also having a good night for Vintage was Ella Pridmore. She ended the night with eight points and five rebounds.
“I just love the way she plays,” Donohoe said of Pridmore. “I don’t know that I pulled her out for a minute or two.”
Napa (0-6, 0-6 VVAL) gained their eight-point edge in large part to the fact that Qui was in foul trouble with three fouls.
“I think we were definitely we were taking the momentum. We were going with it,” Willis explained. “We felt comfortable and confident. I think we felt too comfortable. I think that just kind of happens. In all honesty, we haven’t really been up on teams this year. So, I think we were like ‘okay, we’re right where we want to be.’ But I think we just felt a little too comfortable. Then, Lizzie snuck her way in and she started hitting those shots.”
On the night, the Grizzlies were led by their senior guard duo of Maizy Armstrong-Brown and Sophia Mostow.
Armstrong-Brown ended the night with a double-double. She led the way for her team in both scoring and rebounding with 18 points and 10 rebounds.
“She came to play,” Willis said of Armstrong-Brown’s solid performance. “They worked on a lot of shooting this week. I think she took the energy of it being Big Game being her last. I obviously wasn’t thinking about it like that. She came to play she was going in hard she got I think two and-ones, which builds huge momentum, played great on defense got a lot of deflections.”
Mostow added 10 points and two rebounds as well.
“I think this is Sophia’s best game,” Willis added. “I think she only had one turnover, five steals, ready to shoot.”
Before starting the second half of the league season, Napa will have some non-league road games. On Saturday, they’ll visit Granada-Livermore at 1 pm, then host Windsor on Tuesday at 6 pm. Their next league game will be on Friday at 7 pm at home against Sonoma Valley.
Meanwhile, Vintage will be back in action next Wednesday at 7 pm when they visit American Canyon to start the second half of their league schedule.
In other VVAL games Friday night, American Canyon got the win over Petaluma 57-49. Sonoma Valley also beat Justin-Siena 45-37.
