Kokenis, Johnson add local flavor to Women’s Final Four
Toni Kokenis has breathed Stanford women’s basketball almost since she was a baby. She never missed a Stanford Final Four game on TV.
Now she’s about to play in one.
If it’s a surreal experience, the low-key college freshman isn’t letting on.
“It hasn’t really kicked in, that, ‘Oh my goodness, it’s the Final Four,” said the 2010 Hinsdale Central graduate and two-time Daily Herald All-Area captain. “I’m just looking at it as another game. The whole team feels that way. We’re just focused on what we need to do.”
Kokenis and the Cardinal (33-2) will take on Texas A&M (31-5) in the first national semifinal at 6 p.m. Sunday at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis. Two-time defending champion Connecticut (36-1) will meet Notre Dame (30-7) in the second game.
On the UConn bench is another former area standout, Montini grad Michala Johnson, now a freshman.
UConn had its record 90-game winning streak snapped on Dec. 30 at Stanford but hasn’t lost since. The Huskies already have beaten Notre Dame three times this season. This weekend they will try to become the third team to win three straight national championships, joining the 2002-04 Connecticut teams and Tennessee from 1996-98.
“After the Stanford game everybody had a whole new mindset,” Johnson said. “We don’t want that to happen to us again.”
Stanford has won 27 straight games since consecutive losses at DePaul and Tennessee. Of course the UConn win is the one that captured everyone’s attention, but Kokenis said they have put it in the past.
“Right after we beat them that’s all anybody would talk about, coming up to us in the airports recognizing us as the team that beat UConn. Things have calmed down since then,” Kokenis said. “We don’t want that one game to define our season.”
Johnson has seen limited time as a freshman. She averages 5.4 minutes a game, along with 1.3 points and 1.5 rebounds a contest. Most importantly, perhaps, she reports that her knees feel 100 percent after torn ACLs cut short her junior and senior years at Montini.
“I don’t even think about it,” Johnson said of the knee.
“I expected that a little bit, that I wouldn’t get so much playing time. You have to get into the swing of things and just be patient. I’m just getting comfortable so next year I can make a big impact.”
On a deep, versatile Stanford team Kokenis has made her mark.
Playing 17.4 minutes a game, Kokenis is averaging 5.5 points a game, and she started two games earlier in the season.
In the Pac-10 championship game, Kokenis came off the bench with Stanford trailing UCLA and scored a season-high 17 points — 10 in the final 5 minutes, 17 seconds — to rally the Cardinal to a 64-55 win. Kokenis also scored 9 points in the regional semifinal against North Carolina.
“That was an amazing game,” Kokenis said of the UCLA win. “We showed a lot of character and a lot of heart to come back and dig out of a hole. It was nice for me to take advantage of that opportunity. I’m learning my place in the system, picking my place to attack.”
Kokenis has become a crowd favorite at Stanford’s Maples Pavilion with her scrappy play.
“She brings great energy off the bench,” Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer has been quoted as saying. “It helps her to see what’s going on.”
Stanford, in its fourth straight Final Four, has settled for second place two of the last three years, losing to Tennessee in the 2008 title game and to Connecticut last year. Kokenis and the Cardinal are back to try to win Stanford’s first national championship since 1992.
“We know we can compete with anybody. We just have to go out and do it,” Kokenis said. “Whoever plays best on a given night is going to be the team that wins this.”