After a forgettable junior season, Ryan Cavanagh punctuated a bounceback senior year with a shot he’ll never forget.
Cavanagh swished a three-pointer from the left corner as time expired Friday night, lifting visiting St. Ignatius past No. 6 Brother Rice 62-59 in the Catholic League Blue.
The Wolfpack (16-3, 1-2) regrouped after letting an 11-point third-quarter lead slip away. There were five lead changes in the final two minutes, capped by Cavanagh’s game-winner. Chris Bolte led St. Ignatius with 19 points, Cavanagh scored 16, Northwestern recruit Phoenix Gill had 13 points and six rebounds and Napoleon Harris IV added 11 points.
Brother Rice’s Caden Workman made one of two free throws with 48.7 seconds left to tie the score at 59. St. Ignatius worked the clock down to 12.7 seconds, called a timeout and set up a play for no one in particular.
“The play was for any [of] five guys because we believe all five guys on the court are capable of making that play,” Wolfpack coach Matt Monroe said. “Phoenix made the right read, he found an open guy. But if they didn’t help [on defense], he would have had a layup or maybe would have hit Chris or maybe he would have found Nico [Harris] or he would have found Bubs — Alex Anaya.
“But he made the right play, and the right guy who was open hit it.”
Was it the biggest shot of Cavanagh’s life?
“For sure, 1,000%,” he said. “When I saw that I was having a flare screen, I was like, ‘Oh, I’m hitting this.’ Once-in-a-lifetime opportunity getting that shot, and I hit it.”
Last year, Cavanagh was a rotation player for the Wolfpack when he sprained his left ankle in a December game against Homewood-Flossmoor and wound up missing four weeks.
“It was very frustrating,” he said. “[I was] getting some good minutes and then went back to square one. So this year, stepping into a bigger role is just phenomenal.”
The Wolfpack led 44-33 midway through the third quarter before the Crusaders (17-2, 3-1) scrambled back into the game. Workman’s putback cut the deficit to 47-44 after three and KJ Morris hit a three-pointer at 7:45 of the fourth quarter to tie it. The rest of the period was back-and-forth till Cavanagh delivered the game-winner.
St. Ignatius picked up a signature win a week after losing by 31 to Mount Carmel.
“We thrive as underdogs,” Bolte said. “Came into the season as underdogs, everybody [underestimated] us. When we get back under there and nobody thinks about us, that’s when we strike. We’re dogs, we all work hard.”
Jack Weigus led Rice with 16 points, Citadel recruit Marcos Gonzales had 15 points and seven rebounds, Morris scored 13 and Workman finished with nine points.
“Basketball is a game of runs and we know that,” Monroe said. “We’d be kidding ourselves if we didn’t think that Brother Rice would give us their best shot, and their best shot is really, really good.”
But Cavanagh’s last shot was even better.