Lots of Points, but Less Praise of Prince

Epiphanny Prince of Murry Bergtraum High School in New York scored 113 points Feb. 1 to establish a new national prep single-game scoring record, but her feat elicited little praise from local prep coaches. (Kevin Rivoli - AP)

When Epiphanny Prince of Murry Bergtraum High School in New York scored 113 points Feb. 1 to establish a new national prep single-game scoring record, the feat was of particular interest to three of the top teams in this area -- No. 3 Good Counsel, No. 4 Bishop McNamara and No. 7 Forest Park.

All three had faced Prince in the 3-Point Play Holiday Tournament at Georgetown, where she totaled 75 points in the three games, all wins for Bergtraum, currently ranked second nationally by USA Today.

Local coaches and players laud Prince's talents -- the 5-foot-9 senior guard has committed to Rutgers -- but are less praiseworthy of her record, which came in a 137-32 win over New York's Louis Brandeis.

Prince had racked up a career-high 58 points by halftime, with her team winning 74-11. She continued to play in pursuit of the single-game points record of 105 set by Cheryl Miller in 1982 (in a 179-15 game). Lisa Leslie scored 101 points in the first half of a game in 1990; the second half of that game was not played.

Prince's record did not sit well with Forest Park Coach Chrissy Kelly. "Don't ever ask me to score 113 points," Kelly informed All-Met senior guard Monica Wright the day after Prince set the record. "Because I'll tell you to get the hell away from me."

Kelly said that she could respect the record if it came in a mutually high-scoring game. But not in a 100-point blowout.

"Even if there was no pressure, she had to be doing some kind of work to get 113 points," Wright said. "But if it was up to me, I wouldn't have done something like that. If you're blowing a team out, you could have an injury or anything could have happened. If it was a close game and I scored 113 points fully earned, then I'd be celebrating it."

The top-scoring game from a Washington area girl this season was 47 for Theodore Roosevelt junior guard Brittany Hilliard in an 84-36 win over M.M. Washington on Jan. 19.

Prince made 54 of 60 field goal attempts, most of them layups, with four three-pointers and one free throw. Brandeis Coach Vera Springer, whose team had lost by 93 to Bergtraum earlier in the season, has been quoted as saying that Prince scoring 113 points on her team "was like picking on a handicapped person."

"Did she shoot all those layups cherry-picking, or did she play defense and go down and get a layup?" wondered Bishop McNamara Coach Robert Surratt, whose team, like Good Counsel, lost by eight to Bergtraum. "If she cherry-picked, it was wrong. . . . I'd be trying to defend her to make sure she didn't get it, even if I had to put four people on her."

Good Counsel Coach Tom Splaine told senior post player Kaili McLaren, a Connecticut signee, that Prince's feat was one of endurance as much as one of scoring.

"I thought her arms would have been tired if she was shooting so much," Splaine said. "Most players don't do that in practice with nobody on them."