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WILKES-BARRE — In her first PIAA game, Irelyn Jannuzzi wasn’t messing around.
On the same floor where her father once dropped shot after shot, Jannuzzi showed off some shooting skills of her own.
And pretty soon, the newness for Jannuzzi of playing in a Pennsylvania state girls basketball tournament turned into a familiar feeling for Holy Redeemer.
Jannuzzi scored eight of her 14 points in the first quarter Saturday, Talia Kosierowski scored 14 more and Redeemer rolled over Bodine, 65-33 in a PIAA Class 3A opener at Wilkes University’s Marts Center.
“At halftime, we said we needed to come together,” Jannuzzi said. “This is states. This is important. We’re not here to play around, just get it done.”
The Royals didn’t need much mid-game resolve to break away from Bodine and charge into Wednesday’s second round against 27-1 Mount Carmel, the District 4 champ.
Jannuzzi hit a short stop-and-pop jumper, then followed it with a 3-point goal to give Redeemer a quick 7-2 lead little more than two minutes into the game.
The daughter of Dave Jannuzzi, who led Wilkes University to the 1998 Division 3 Final Four, didn’t stop there.
She finished off the first quarter with another jumper and a free throw while helping the Royals take an early 11-point lead, then added four points in the third quarter as Redeemer’s advantage grew to 53-30.
“Irelyn’s a player,” first-year Holy Redeemer coach John Jezorwski said. “She has some great skills. She can stroke the ball. She’s a shooter. When we moved her to the point, things started going right for us.”
They went right all night for the 22-5 Royals, who won for the 21st time in their past 23 games with a fast-break attack and a swarming press defense that flustered 7-11 Bodine into 22 turnovers.
That helped calm the jitters of Jannuzzi, a junior who spent her first two high school seasons playing in New Jersey before enrolling at Holy Redeemer when her family returned to the Wyoming Valley for her 2016-17 school year.
“A little nervous,” Jannuzzi said about her emotions while making her PIAA tournament debut. “But when you step in the court, the nerves go away. And the girls on the team helped take my nerves away.”
It’s easy to see why, since Jannuzzi had plenty of help from a Royals team that raced up and down the floor with an upbeat energy that lasted to the game’s end.
Senior guard Kosierowski, coming off the bench for the second straight game after starting for most of the season, scored 10 points in the first half, including a 3-pointer that gave Redeemer a 15-point lead near the end of the first half. Meanwhile, Julia Andrejko and reserve Camercon Marcinkowski both finished with eight points. And 6-foot freshman Sam Yencha — the star of Redeemer’s upset of previously unbeaten Dunmore in last weekend’s District 2 title game — scored all seven of her points in the second half.
“We’re at our best when we have four or five girls at nine, 12 points,” Jezorwski said. “We can have seven girls get 10 points in a game. And that’s our goal, to score 70.”
The Royals didn’t quite need that output Saturday, holding Bodine to just seven points in the first quarter and three in the fourth while dominating the middle periods as their lead kept growing.
So much so, Redeemer was able to pretty much empty its bench by the end, while playing a total of 16 girls who all received experience in state play that could turn valuable in the coming weeks.
“It’s hard, because we have so many good players who don’t get recognition,” Jezorwski said. “Those girls work so hard in practice to get us ready for these games. We have some great practices that are sometimes harder than our games. The girls coming off the bench, they just give us everything.”
Holy Redeemer 65, Bodine 33
BODINE (33) — Jala Cosley 0 0-0 0, Amaya Moore 0 0-0 0, Canya Harp 3 0-0 8, Kaylah Santiago 1 1-2 3, Keyanah Price 8 4-4 22, Lexa Williams-Horsey 0 0-0 0, Sabriyah Graham 0 0-0 0, Bene Jeanette 0 0-0 0. Totals 12 5-6 33.
HOLY REDEEMER (65) — Maya Kornfeld 0 0-0 0, Irelyn Jannuzzi 6 1-2 14, Julia Andrejko 3 2-2 8, Sam Yencha 3 1-2 7, Sam Rajza 2 1-1 6, Talia Kosierowski 6 1-2 14, Cameron Marcinkowski 4 0-0 8, Randie Kuhar 0 0-0 0, Lauren Wasiakowski 1 0-0 2, Sarah Kuderka 1 0-0 2, Carly Cavanaugh 0 0-0 0, Jordan Cicon 0 0-0 0, Liv Moore 0 2-2 2, Alyssa Gushka 1 0-0 2, Alesha Pekarovsky 0 0-0 0, Annie Bagnall 0 0-0 0. Totals 27 8-11 65.
Bodine`7`12`11`3`—`33
Holy Redeemer`18`15`20`12`—`65
Three-point goals — BOD 4 (Harp 2, Price 2); HR 3 (Jannuzzi, Rajza, Kosierowski).
