Swiss exchange student the ‘glue’ for Beaufort Academy girls basketball

Joelle Zingg didn’t realize she’d been fouled, much less that she’d earned two free throws.

A teammate clued her in.

Zingg, whose blue eyes complemented the No. 4 on her Beaufort Academy jersey, stepped to the line.

The junior guard had specifically worked on her free throws the day before the Jan. 14 contest against Bible Baptist.

But this was a real game.

And her mother was there – Miriam Griessen sat in the corner of the Beaufort Academy gym. She’d traveled from Switzerland to watch her daughter play.

“Everyone was, like, yelling ‘JOELLE!’” said Zingg, a Swiss student attending Beaufort Academy through the Rotary Youth Exchange program. “And I was (thinking), ‘That’s so much pressure.’”

Zingg shot her first free throw.

A miss.

Her coach had told the other Eagles before the game to try to get her a basket. After all, her mom had come all that way.

Zingg, who’d never played organized basketball before the 2015-16 season, had stepped onto the floor that night preoccupied with scoring. That was her yearlong goal, – simply to score. Just once.

Zingg readied for her second attempt.

The game was in hand, a blowout. Pride was the only thing riding on the shot. She looked nervous, her mother remembers.

She missed.

She saw the clock winding down, saw her mom in the stands. She’d been on the floor about 20 minutes against Bible Baptist, had managed to get a steal and grab a rebound. But no points.

“I’m sure she probably put some pressure on herself,” Eagles varsity girls basketball coach Scott Huebel said Tuesday. “She took some shots early that were ill-advised. She had some layup opportunities she missed. She was disappointed after the game.”

Beaufort Academy went on to beat Bible Baptist that night. But the Eagles would lose their next seven games. And as their final game approached, Zingg still hadn’t scored.

Huebel, who called Zingg the Eagles’ “glue,” said her teammates were determined to remedy that.

The 2015-16 Eagles were a young team, cobbled together from a small contingent of varsity girls and some junior varsity players, including some eighth graders. Their schedule included several games against larger Class 2-A schools. And Huebel was a first-year varsity coach.

Zingg didn’t play in the team’s first contest. She was relieved. Still learning the game.

Huebel had first seen her shoot in November. She was pushing the ball with both hands, he said, and her left leg would come off the floor.

“I asked her to set some clear goals for herself,” Huebel said. “(She said), ‘I want to learn the vocabulary of the game. I want to learn the rules. ... And I want to be able to score in a game.’”

While Zingg was a newcomer to competitive, organized basketball, she’d played the sport before in school, in Switzerland. The boys hogged the ball, she said. And she got a bad grade in her sports class because she couldn’t make her layups.

Back home in Zweisimmen, Switzerland, she’d preferred snowboarding the mountains that ringed the valley farming town of about 3,000 residents. And horseback riding. She didn’t like basketball.

She played for Beaufort Academy because most of her classmates played sports. Basketball also gave her something to do after school. And it kept her active – exchange students exploring new food cultures could put on pounds if they sat around, she joked.

As the Eagles slogged through their seven-game skid, even Zingg – “the optimist,” in Huebel’s words – was discouraged.

They rebounded, though, with a win over Hilton Head Prep on Feb. 5. Then, two-straight losses. Their last game of the regular season was Feb. 16 against Charleston Collegiate. On the road.

Zingg didn’t think about scoring against Charleston Collegiate. While her teammates psyched up themselves for the game, she watched movie “The Fault in our Stars.”

But the Eagles would mount a large lead, and Zingg would be out on the court.

With just over three and a half minutes left in the game, All-Area guard Sissy Mungin nabbed a steal and passed the ball ahead to Mary Keane to start the fast break. Keane, almost under the basket, looked over and saw a wide-open Joelle Zinng, standing on the right block.

Keane passed the ball.

It was a bounce pass, a bit low. Zingg bent down, fielded it and went up for the shot. The ball kissed off the glass.

And went through the hoop.

Her teammates screamed from the bench. A Beaufort Academy student filming the game nearly dropped her iPhone. The Eagles’ impromptu celebration confused the Charleston Collegiate fans, and stalled the game.

“Don’t force yourself, don’t let yourself be forced by other people,” Zingg said, explaining what she’d learned during the season. “Don’t let the pressure come over you.”

“(Against Bible Baptist) the pressure was there. I forced myself, and it didn’t work out. And (against Charleston Collegiate), it was was, like, ‘Go out and have fun.’ And it worked out.”

Later in the fourth quarter Zingg ended up with the ball again. Huebel gave her a thumbs up, the signal to shoot. She did.

“It was close,” she said.

Then she smiled.

This story was originally published March 17, 2016 at 9:18 AM with the headline "Swiss exchange student the ‘glue’ for Beaufort Academy girls basketball."