Gator greatness
Geibel Catholic\'s Larkin set to break Bortz’ scoring record, surpass 2,000 points
Emma Larkin never imagined she would be in this position.
The Geibel Catholic senior is on the verge of surpassing Shelley Bortz as the Lady Gators girls basketball all-time scoring leader as well as the 2,000-point mark.
Larkin entered the season with 1,909 points, just 68 short of Bortz’ record of 1,977. She scored 30 and 27 points as Geibel opened with wins over Carmichaels (71-16) and Beth-Center (72-24) on Friday and Saturday at Jefferson-Morgan’s Donna Furnier Invitational.
That leaves Larkin, an extremely versatile 5-foot-5 point guard, 11 points away from Bortz and 34 short of 2,000 heading into tonight’s home game against Southmoreland.
“I always dreamt of scoring 1,000 points but I never even thought of breaking Shelley’s record or getting to 2,000 points back when I started,” said Larkin who has officially signed to continue her basketball career at NCAA Division-II Belmont Abbey in North Carolina.
Bortz set the record during the 1991-92 season when she helped Geibel reach the WPIAL championship game for the second year in a row although the Lady Gators fell short both times, to St. Francis Academy and Serra Catholic.
Larkin would love to emulate Bortz in that way as well and play in a district final. Geibel has qualified for the WPIAL playoffs in each of Larkin’s first three years and, after suffering first-round losses in their first two appearances, the Lady Gators reached the WPIAL semifinals last year, falling just one win short of playing at Petersen Events Center.
“Oh my gosh, dream come true,” Larkin said of what it would mean to play there in the WPIAL championship game as a senior. “I want us to get there and play on that stage with the big screen they have there and just that whole atmosphere.”
While Bortz got there but fell short of a title she still looks back on her career with fondness.
“I’m honored my 1,977-point record lasted 33 years,” said Bortz, who is now an anchor/reporter at KDKA. “I worked hard for every one of those points so seeing it stand that long means a lot to me. But, when Emma finally breaks it, I’ll be the first to congratulate her.
“It takes something special to reach that level and I couldn’t be more excited to see her name at the top of that list.”
Bortz said would attempt to be present at tonight’s game but wouldn’t know for sure if her schedule would allow it until Monday morning.
Larkin had some doubts she’d ever come close to attaining such lofty heights when her career began.
Larkin transferred from Albert Gallatin to Geibel before her freshman season and played under her mother, Sara Larkin, who took over as head coach the previous year.
“Those first two games were rough,” said Larkin, recalling losses at Brownsville’s Falcon Fest to Chartiers-Houston, 46-15, and the host Lady Falcons, 50-23.
“I’m a new transfer coming in and I had high expectations. I was just on an undefeated team in middle school at AG. So I’m thinking coming into this we’re going to do good, we’re going to win. Then all those thoughts went crashing down and I was, oh no, was this the right decision?”
The Lady Gators began Larkin’s freshman season 1-4 but bounced back to finish the regular season at 11-11, including 5-5 in section play to earn a playoff berth for the first time in six years.
“Once we got into section play and kind of settled down, I was like, OK, we’re not that bad, we’re getting better, we got this,” Larkin said.
The 11 wins marked an extreme improvement from a team that had gone a combined 4-64 the previous four seasons with two of those wins coming in Sara’s first season there.
The Lady Gators went 16-7 overall and 8-2 in section play in Emma’s sophomore year, again qualifying for the postseason.
One of the highlights that season was a 51-point performance by Larkin at Avella that broke the school’s single-game scoring record previously held by — you guessed it — Bortz, with 49.
Last year the Lady Gators finished with a 22-4 record and won the section championship with a 13-1 mark. The season included a 15-game winning streak and Geibel’s first trip to the PIAA tournament since 1999.
Now she’s in her final year at Geibel.
“It’s just crazy,” Larkin said. “It feels like my whole high school career went by in the blink of an eye. I’ve heard other people say that and they’re not lying, it’s so true.”
While she’s about to pass Bortz and the 2,000 milestone on the career scoring list, another goal is within reach, that being the Fayette County girls basketball record of 2,440 points by Albert Gallatin’s Loui Hall, now known as Ellen Guillard who is head coach at Taylor Allderdice’s girls basketball team.
Bortz and Hall are both members of the Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame, putting Larkin in rare air.
Larkin does her best to try not to be distracted by all the hoopla.
“I try not to think about the records and the great players I’m chasing and keep that in the back of my head because I know if it slips into my mind I’m going to lose my concentration and not play well,” she said. “I just go in with like, execute the game plan and win, versus, oh my gosh I’m this many points away from whatever.
“I just take it one step at a time and try not to think of all that.”
Her mother, however, is soaking it all in.
“I’m in the mindset right now where I just really want to go slow and enjoy the season because I know this is it for Emma,” Sara said. “It’s amazing that she’s even close to Shelley because I came in here with no expectations that was going to be possible. Then the Fayette County record, I have connections to AG with Loui Hall and I played with Shauntai Hall, her older sister, when I was in high school. It’s like I’m kind of living in a fantasy right now. It’s awesome.
“But it’s one of those things where you can’t just constantly think about all that, you have to try to focus on game by game.”
Emma is appreciative of all that Sara has taught her as a coach, even if, as expected, the mother-daughter relationship can be a bit strained at times.
“We do have bad days once in a while, especially when we lose,” Emma said with a chuckle. “I would say the hardest part comes from the outside, though. People look at us and say well she’s the coach’s daughter, she just starts and scores all those points and is the captain because she’s the coach’s daughter. That’s not it at all.
“First off when we’re on the court it’s not mom, it’s coach. Outside of basketball sometimes it is hard to separate mom and coach but we’ve worked on that through the years and it’s gotten better. I could not imagine anybody else being my coach for my high school years. She’s helped so much with so many things and so many different aspects.”
Both took a peak ahead to when Emma will go off the college at Belmont Abbey.
“It’s going to be tough when she leaves,” Sara said. “The good thing is they livestream all of their games so I’m going to be able to watch whether I’m there or here so that’s a plus. And it’s really not that far, about six hours. We can go down and back in a weekend, no problem, and get to see her play live when they’re at home.
“I think signing day for her was a huge relief, like she knows where she’s going and now she can go enjoy her senior season.”
Emma agreed.
“It was good to get that all taken care of and out of the way before the season,” Emma said. “It’s going to be different. I love my coach (Kim Lusk) there, I feel super comfortable with her. It is far away but I’m excited to kind of flap my wings and see how it goes.
“I love the campus. It’s kind of tucked away and quiet but not far down the road you have shops and a cute little town, and then also I’m just 30 minutes from Charlotte.
“I’m going to major in biology and minor in chem and I want to go the pre-med track so after four years of undergrad I want to go to med school.”
Before all that, Emma has her mind set on doing everything she can to help the Lady Gators have another highly successful season. She’ll play the do-it-all role as she has in her previous three years at Geibel.
“I try to be everywhere, I try to be a pest, I try to rebound, I try to make good passes and try to play as good a defense as possible because you can’t have offense without defense,” Emma said.
“Basically I just want to do whatever I have to do that game to help us win.”