Mount Pulaski Lady Toppers stay
undefeated with 53-29 win over Nokomis
[January 19, 2026]
The Lady Toppers are now 18-0 to start the season after
defeating Nokomis 53-29 on Saturday afternoon on Donna Dulle Court
in Mount Pulaski.
Alyson Murphy led Mount Pulaski with 20 points and Addison Brown hit
a couple 3s along with other key baskets to tally 14 points.
First quarter
Mount Pulaski had a fantastic first quarter against the Nokomis Lady
Redskins as the home team literally ran out to a 19-4 lead. Alyson
Murphy topped the Mount Pulaski scoreboard with eleven points in
that first quarter.
Murphy’s jumper in the lane started the scoring just over thirty
seconds into the game. Audrey Cooper followed with a jumper from the
free throw line just over a minute later. As the 6:00 mark was
eclipsed, Addison Brown tossed in a bucket and the 6-0 lead had the
Lady Redskins flustered. The visitors had already committed a few
too many turnovers. Mount Pulaski coach Ryan McVickers was animated
on the sidelines and yelling, “We’re flying!” The Nokomis coach
decided to call a timeout.
Murphy responded from the timeout by draining a three by the Nokomis
bench and the result was a 9-0 lead that caused the Lady Redskins
more frustration. Finally, at the 5:11 mark, Kinley Stolte scored in
the paint for Nokomis. But ten seconds later it was Murphy setting
up in the corner again by the Nokomis bench and she swished another
three to make the score 12-2 in Mount Pulaski’s favor. After a
Nokomis miss at the other end, Cooper was playing catch me if you
can as she retrieved the rebound and ran all the way to Mount
Pulaski’s end to pour in another two points.
Stolte would score the Lady Redskins second basket at the 3:42 mark.
Mount Pulaski would add to the 14-4 lead via two free throws from
Elayna Marten and a perfectly executed play in which Coach McVickers
kept yelling from the sidelines, “We’re gonna get a layup!” Turns
out after passing the ball around for a minute, Ella Martin passed
it out to Murphy on the perimeter and she tossed up a three that
rattled home with just a handful of seconds left on the clock.
That’s how the Lady Toppers ended up with a 19-4 lead.
Second quarter
Mount Pulaski just managed one three-pointer from Brown in the
second quarter and as a team they went 7-for-10 from the free throw
line to account for the rest of the scoring. Still the Lady Toppers
maintained a respectable 29-15 lead over the Lady Redskins.
Third quarter
Brown’s long three early in the third put Mount Pulaski up 32-17.
Both teams came out with fresh legs in the third and really kept the
running game going strong. Brown was also fouled on her next
three-point attempt and she calmly sank all three shots at the free
throw line. Piper Tyson tossed in the next four points for Mount
Pulaski. First she was strong with the putback at the 4:20 mark and
then she sank a short baseline jumper at the 3:48 mark. Before the
quarter ended Mount Pulaski was 3-for-4 from the free throw line and
Murphy scored one last basket with seconds to go to stretch the lead
to 44-24. Murphy’s bucket was thanks to Cooper’s steal and assist.
Fourth quarter
Cooper and Murphy combined to drive the score to 50-26 as the midway
point of the final quarter was reached. Marten sank one more free
throw and Brown drove the lane for the last Topper basket as the
final score of 53-29 was reached in front of a terrific Saturday
afternoon crowd who really showed their appreciation for the ladies'
hard work.
An 18-0 record is not an easy feat to achieve and in fact, in this
year’s Women’s College Basketball only the University of Connecticut
Huskies and the Vanderbilt Commodores remain undefeated at 18-0.
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Senior Alyson Murphy is a big reason why Mount Pulaski is off to an
18-0 start. Photo courtesy of Rob Siebert
Mount Pulaski joins some pretty elite company, albeit at the high
school level.
Coach Ryan McVickers and his wife Dr. Lindsey
Mason McVickers after Saturday’s win. Photo by Teena Lowery
“Oh wow, 18-0. They’re never easy,” said Mount Pulaski coach Ryan
McVickers. “We knew Nokomis coming in would be a really good 1A
basketball team. We’ve won 20 games the last four or five years and
they also win 20 games every single year. We knew this was a
big-time matchup for us and like always our girls took care of
business.”
Nokomis had a size advantage over Mount Pulaski but that didn’t
stand in the way of Murphy, Marten and Company.
“We knew coming in they were big and strong and just a physical
basketball team,” said McVickers. “But we knew playing our game,
we’re just so fast, we just wanted to jump on them early and just
kind of use our speed and I thought we really did that today.”
Mount Pulaski will have a couple tough home games this week, one on
Tuesday and one on Thursday.
“We’ve got Olympia next, who just beat LeRoy, who just beat Auburn
and they’re playing some good basketball right now. Then we’ve got
Illini Bluffs on Thursday. That’s always the one we’ve got a big
circle around on the schedule. Plus Bluffs will be for the
conference championship. They beat us pretty badly last year so
we’re hoping to get a little bit of revenge on that.”
So mark your calendars for some exciting basketball this week in
Mount Pulaski.
Back to Saturday afternoon, Nokomis won the JV game 47-24 over Mount
Pulaski.
Mount Pulaski will host Olympia on Tuesday night with the JV
starting at 6:00 p.m. The Varsity will follow at 7:30 p.m.
Varsity scoring
Mount Pulaski 53
Murphy 20
Brown 14
Marten 7
Cooper 6
Tyson 5
Martin 1
Nokomis 29
Stolte 8
Sabol 8
Engelman 5
Marley 4
Bertolino 2
Dirks 2
JV scoring
Mount Pulaski 24
Johnston 8
Killion 6
Rhoades 4
Werts 4
Leonard 2
Nokomis 47
Bertolino 13
Morley 12
Cress 7
West 6
Jackson 5
Suslee 4
[Teena Lowery]
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