Tag: Ava LaMonica

by Mike Pavlichko

After hustling for four varsity seasons, Rutgers Prep’s Ava LaMonica reflects on her time as an Argonaut, and finishing on top in Somerset County

The 2024-25 girls’ basketball season hurt for Rutgers Prep, and then-junior Ava LaMonica. There was no division title – at least not outright – they got knocked out of the Somerset County Tournament by her hometown public school of Hillsborough, and lost to eventual Non-Public B group champion Gloucester Catholic in the South B finals.

That wasn’t want LaMonica was used to her first two years at the Somerset school.

But with everyone back, the team rededicated itself to its goals, and in the end, got two out of three.

Rutgers Prep finished as the No. 1 team in Central Jersey, in the Bellamy & Son Paving final rankings, as the Argonauts went 25-4, won the Skyland Conference Delaware Division with a 6-0 record, and beat Franklin in the Somerset County Tournament title game.

That makes it three county titles, three outright division titles, one shared, and two sectional championships in four years for LaMonica, who – along with Cali McCoy off the bench – is the only four-year Rutgers Prep varsity player to graduate this year.

She finishes as a member of the thousand-point, 500-rebound club, scoring 1,132 points and grabbing 527 rebounds over her career, and laid it all out there every time she was on the court, fighting for rebounds, diving after loose balls, and deflecting passes by the opposition to get the Argonauts out in transition.

And if she’s hasn’t had enough of the snow this winter, she’ll see plenty more most likely when she takes her talents to the University at Buffalo next year.

Click below to hear Rutgers Prep senior Ava LaMonica talk about the 2025-26 season, the Argonauts return as Somerset County Tournament champions, and her time spent alongside great players and head coach Mary Klinger:

by Mike Pavlichko

No. 1 Rutgers Prep takes Skyland Conference Delaware Division title, tops No. 3 Gill St. Bernard’s, 51-44

Rutgers Prep may have been 20-7 a year ago, but the 2024-25 high school basketball season was disappointing for Mary Klinger’s squad. They were co-champs in the Skyland Conference Delaware Division, but failed to make the Somerset County Tournament final for the first time in a decade, and lost in the Non-Public South B title game.

This year’s team used it as fuel, though, and is already back on track.

The top-ranked Argonauts are now 15-2 after a 51-44 win Thursday night over third-ranked Gill St. Bernards heard on Central Jersey Sports Radio, one which gave the the Delaware Division title outright, finishing 4-0 in division play.

That’s Goal One entering the year. Then the county, then states. Even if head coach Mary Klinger had to be reminded of her team’s claim to the title after the game.

The first half was played as tight as it could be. No one led by more than five, there were seven lead changes, and six ties, the last being 24-24 at halftime.

But after that, the Prep defense tightened. Gill senior Addy Platt – who was tied with Prep senior Ava LaMonica for game-high honors at halftime with nine points – was held scoreless in the third quarter, and had just one second-half field goal. She finished with a game-high 17, including 6-of-6 at the line in the fourth quarter, but was hampered by foul trouble.

That’s because Prep was taking it to the tin more, looking for contact. And it worked. The Argos shot 8-of-10 from the foul line in the fourth.

LaMonica finished with 14 – and is eleven away from joining the thousand-point club, while sophomore Hailey Benbow led with 15, including three from beyond the arc.

Gill is now 14-4, finishing 3-1 in their division, and had its 12-game win streak – which ran back to late December – snapped in the process.

Click below for postgame reaction from Rutgers Prep senior Ava LaMonica and head coach Mary Klinger, presented by Sportsplex at Metuchen:

by Mike Pavlichko

Central Jersey Sports Radio Somerset County Girls’ Basketball Player of the Year: Gill’s Gandy Malou-Mamel has stellar year, heads to UConn

All across the state of New Jersey, every year, dozens upon dozens of players will graduate and play at the college level. But only a handful get to go play for a major college program that has won multiple national championships.

But that’s the future for Gandy Malou-Mamel, the Gill St. Bernard’s senior who is the 2025 Central Jersey Sports Radio Girls’ Basketball Player of the Year.

Malou-Mamel didn’t start playing basketball in earnest until she was 12, and in her native Ireland. But playing for the Huskies and the legendary Geno Auriemma was her dream. Now that her career at Gill is over, that’s her reality.

She earned the chance to play in Storrs over the span of three seasons, in which she averaged almost 14 points per game in her career – 1,144 total – and a career-best 17 points a game this season, her senior year. She had double-doubles in 18 of her 28 games this season, and averaged a double-double, at 10.2 boards a game this season. She also recorded almost 200 career blocks (60 this year) and 40 steals.

At 6′ 6″, she was dominant much of her career, and especially this season, leading Gill St. Bernard’s to its first Somerset County Tournament title since 2014, as well as the Non-Public North B finals, where they lost to Immaculate Conception of Montclair, which is closing at the end of the school year.

Unfortunately – for us, not her! – Gill is on Spring Break this week and next, and Malou-Mamel is back home in her native Ireland, where coach Mark Gnapp says she often disconnects and recharges. So we had Gnapp speak on her behalf to talk about her season and career at Gill.

Click below to hear Gill St. Bernard’s head coach Mark Gnapp talk about Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Somerset County Girls’ Player of the Year Gandy Malou-Mamel:

Here are our Honorable Mentions for Somerset County Girls’ Player of the Year:

  • Aleah Sunkins, Franklin: Sunkins had an impressive freshman campaign, and there was no hint of a sophomore slump in 2024-25. While Precious Wheeler is a tenacious defender, Sunkins averaged 15.5 points per game and 8.5 rebounds in her second season as a varsity starter, and eight double-doubles this season for a squad that may have gone 11-16 this year, but they also played in perhaps the toughest girls’ basketball division in the state, losing three times to Gill St. Bernard’s and twice to Rutgers Prep – both state sectional finalists – as well as twice to Hillsborough, the state Group 4 champs and No. 4 team in the final statewide rankings. That’s seven losses – almost half their overall total – to state-ranked teams just in their division alone.
  • Francesca Schiro, Hillbsorough: A talented all-around team, the Raiders don’t do what they did without “Cesci.” With back-to-back Central Jersey Group 4 titles, and this year the state Group 4 title – Hillsborough’s first ever – Schiro was instrumental in it all. This Siena-bound senior averaged 21.1 points per game this season, 6.3 rebounds, and led the tea, in assists (156) and steals (120). She was the undisputed leader of the team, and had big buckets down the stretch of the state finals against West Orange, along with fellow senior Mya Loniewski.
  • Taylor Francis, Pingry: The all-time leading scorer in school history, she finishes with 1,793 points before heading off to Georgetown to play softball. She averaged 27.3 points per game this year, with 66 treys, on a team that went 19-8 this season, and won the Skyland Conference Raritan Division by running the table to a 10-0 record.
  • Ava LaMonica, Rutgers Prep: Just a junior, it just seems like LaMonica has been an Argonaut for the last five years. A fierce competitor not afraid to hit the deck if she’s fouled hard or diving for a loose ball, she led a young, inexperienced group with 65 steals this season while averaging 13.4 points and 5 rebounds per game. And if the band stays together – last year’s team lost three starters to graduation, while another moved to Florida – next year’s group, with another year under its belt – could be primed for something big.
  • Charlotte Taylor, Somerville: While junior Kaylee Lauber also had a fantastic season, and was the team’s leading scorer, Taylor gets the nod here as a senior who’s been consistent her entire career. Averaging 11.5 points, four rebounds, and five asissts per game, Taylor played the senior leader role to a tee on a 23-6 team that went to the North 2, Group 3 semifinals.

Rutgers Prep vs Hillsborough
by Mike Pavlichko

Strong start for No. 1 Rutgers Prep girls hands No. 3 Hillsborough season’s first loss

Rutgers Prep girls’ basketball coach Mary Klinger often calls the regular season the preseason, a time for her to figure out what her team is for when the games really count:  in the county tournament and the states.

She’s still working on that.  After all, the season isn’t even a month old yet. 

But one thing she does know:  in the first few weeks of 2024-25, her top-ranked Argonauts have beaten the two biggest threats they’ll face in Skyland Conference play. 

First, it was Gill St. Bernard’s on opening night.  Thursday, it was Hillsborough, as the Argonauts handed the third-ranked Raiders their first loss of the season, 66-52.

Junior Ava LaMonica – who’s from Hillsborough – tied a career high, scoring 22 against her hometown team.  She had seven in the first quarter and eleven points in the third.

Prep got out to a 6-0 lead on three straight drives to the hoop by junior Sophia Georgiades.  They built up slowly to a 23-point halftime lead before winning by 14.

The Argonauts (8-2, 4-0 Skyland Delaware) now have won 53 straight games against Somerset County opponents and 68 straight against Skyland Conference does, their last loss to either coming in the 2019 Somerset County Tournament final to Franklin, which won the Tournament of Champions that year.

Hillsborough (8-1, 3-1 Skyland Delaware) was led by Francesca “Cesci” Schiro with 18.

Click below for postgame reaction from Rutgers Prep junior Ava LaMonica and head coach Mary Klinger, presented by Sportsplext at Metuchen: