For a team with many cards stacked against them, Rye Neck girls basketball is persevering and pushing for a return to the playoffs.
The Panthers started the season 5-2, including a 4-0 mark in league play, but have been slowed by injuries, including torn ACLs for two of the team’s four upperclassmen. Despite falling to 6-9, Rye Neck still sits sixth in the Class B standings, with its final five regular-season games packed into the first 11 days of February.
Fortunately, a trio of young captains — sophomore Nina Muller, junior Bree Tunno, and her sister, sophomore Paityn Tunno — have provided optimism the Panthers can improve on last year’s first-round exit from the Class A playoffs, a two-point loss to Irvington.
“They’ve all done a good job stepping up into those leadership roles, and it’s definitely been a learning process for them,” said second-year head coach Daniel Linehan. “They’re figuring it out and growing as the season’s gone along, but the effort is really there. We’re a young team, so there’s going to be opportunities for everyone to showcase some leadership, whether it’s through words, through actions, or off the court.”
Muller has shown flashes of greatness, scoring a career-best 32 points in back-to-back wins against Valhalla and Dobbs Ferry in December. She followed up a 25-point outing against Ardsley with 18- and 19-point games in late January.
In addition to leading the team in scoring (17.1 points per game) and rebounds (8.5), the sophomore averages 1.8 assists, tied with Bree Tunno for the team lead. Both Tunno sisters average seven points per game, and Bree averages a team-best 2.7 steals.
Linehan commended the captains for helping drive the culture in their shared second year. The group has learned to play to each others’ strengths — with Bree Tunno as a vocal leader, Paityn Tunno leading through actions, and Muller a mix of both.
“Paityn was coming after school from field hockey games to come get extra shots off, and then bringing everybody along with her,” Linehan said. “I think they’ve all been feeling each other out and have done a good job relaying that to everybody else.”
The team’s development of underclassmen has ensured depth and consistency, even amid key injuries. A prime example is the year-to-year improvement of freshman Mariam Asghar.
“Her defense has been lights out,” he said. “She’s taken such great strides with that, so that’s been huge for us.”
Freshman Adriana Perez and sophomore Charlotte Picone have also joined the rotation and grown accustomed to increased responsibility on the court.
“Defensively, rebounding, they’ve been awesome for us,” Linehan said. “They’ve been putting a lot of work in, too, offensively. We’re encouraging them to be more aggressive and attack more offensively, and showcase all of the hard work that they’ve put in.”
As the postseason looms for this young group, the goal is to continue steadily progressing, not just so they can maximize the games they play together this season, but so they’ll have playoff experience to call back on as juniors and seniors in the years ahead.
“What I’ve been trying to preach, and they’ve done a good job buying into, is how we close that gap by doing all the little things to the best of our ability,” Linehan said. “Whether it’s playing great defense, talking, diving on a loose ball, taking charges — all those kinds of intangible things …. Focusing on how we can learn, how we can grow, how we can get better every day so when it comes playoff time — and it’s win-or-go-home — we’re playing our absolute best basketball.”
