Marysville girls basketball establishes itself as favorite in the MAC Blue

MARYSVILLE — After 11 years competing in the MAC Gold, the Marysville girls basketball team moved up to the MAC Blue this season.

It was a well-deserved promotion for the Vikings. They'd won the last two Gold championships and went 16-0 in league play during that stretch.

Yet the Blue is a bigger challenge with better competition. And Marysville graduated a good chunk of its players from last year's historic run to a state quarterfinal.

On paper, it would appear the Vikings are in for a rude awakening. But that couldn't be further from the truth.

"We've got a nice mixture of returning payers and some youth," Marysville coach Ryan Rathje said. "We didn't get off to the best start (1-2). We were still learning our roles and everything. But the girls have been having great practices and working hard. They're pushing each other and I think that's really been the biggest key."

Marysville is now 9-3 overall and 5-0 in the MAC Blue. Against conference opponents, the Vikings are scoring 48.8 points per game with an average margin of victory of 21.4. They're also 6-0 at home and have won their past four games.

"This year, it's been more of sharing the ball around," senior guard Kara Miller said. "Everybody is getting points and playing good defense. We're really good at coming together as a team and making everybody successful with each other."

"We've all realized we're young and we're new," senior guard Meghan Winston said. "We lost a huge senior class and it's going to be hard to do (what we did last year) again. But we never let that stop us. The younger girls — once they got the intensity of it all — haven't stopped. All they've been doing is getting better and pushing (forward)."

Added Winston: "That's even made us upperclassmen better, too. And I think us putting a lot on them has made (the team) better as a whole."

In terms of experience, the Vikings' roster is quite balanced. It's made up of four seniors, four juniors, two sophomores and one freshman. Marysville has gotten production from just about everyone, including the three underclassmen.

"Kendal Quain is a freshman and she doesn't play like it," Rathje said. "She is super smart, hard working and just a great kid. She's given us a big lift on both ends of the floor.

"Her sister, Ryan, has been improving every game. (Ryan Quain) and Addison Mynsberge are both sophomores and they were leaders last year on the (junior varsity) team. They've come here and haven't missed a beat ... those three young girls have really stepped up their game."

Teammates have also noticed their growth.

"Kendal has improved a lot since the beginning of the season," Miller said. "She's gotten a lot better at defense and rebounding. And she's making buckets when we need her to. Ryan and Addison have also stepped up as leaders on the court."

The newcomers have fit right in on a team led by veterans like Miller, Winston, Avery Wolters and Ava Grant. Those four helped the program finish 22-3 and capture its first-ever regional championship in 2022. But they're as hungry as ever to accomplish more.

"We have really intense practices," Winston said. "And that's just kind of our motto — you have to be better . You have to be intense, play every game like it's your last. It's about bettering ourselves."

The Vikings certainly did that Wednesday, when they pulled away from Warren Cousino in a 53-37 victory at home. Marysville snapped the Patriots' four-game winning streak and kept them in second place in the MAC Blue.

"Cousino is really athletic and hard-working," Rathje said. "They're tough to match up against and they're very well coached. So, today was a really tough game that we got to play. I was proud of the way that our girls kept battling."

The Vikings held a 21-18 lead at halftime. But they outscored the Patriots, 32-19, in the second half to stay perfect in conference play.

"We want to keep establishing ourselves every game," Miller said. "And proving that we should be ahead in this league. We always want to be working hard — whether we're up or down — and keep playing to our ability."

"We're really big on defense, rebounding, boxing out and doing those little things," Winston said. "If we keep doing the little things on defense and coming out super intense, we'll just keep rolling. With that, I think our offense will come and everything else is going to fall into place."

Contact Brenden Welper at bwelper@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @BrendenWelper.