Olivia Esquivel acknowledges she bears a certain weight as a basketball player at Griffith.
The 5-foot-7 junior point guard is the youngest of five sisters to play for the Panthers.
“I definitely feel like it’s a lot of pressure because they did a lot of good things here,” Esquivel said. “It’s a lot because I feel like I have to meet the standard.”
But Esquivel has been hitting that mark. She averaged 8.5 points, 4.6 rebounds and team highs of 2.3 assists and 3.7 steals during the regular season and scored a team-high 13 points during Griffith’s 50-24 win over West Side in the first round of the Class 3A Calumet Sectional on Tuesday night.
Esquivel is in her third season as a starter for the Panthers (11-11), who will play Greater South Shore Conference champion Bishop Noll (12-10) in the sectional semifinals on Friday, and is carving her own path.
Esquivel’s sisters include Ariel, a 2021 graduate who set the program record for career points, and Marisa, a 2022 graduate who broke that record and became the program’s first player to eclipse 1,000 points. Esquivel’s sisters Briana, who graduated last year, and Jasmine Alvarez, a 2014 graduate, also made an impact.
“They all keep me motivated,” Esquivel said. “They all show up to the games all the time. So any time I feel like I had a bad game or even a good game, they always push me and tell me I did good.”
Olivia Esquivel’s contributions are obvious to Griffith coach Kevin Ballard.
“Liv is my best ball handler, hands down,” Ballard said. “Her basketball IQ is phenomenal. She’s going to look to make a play. Her role is to make sure that she makes plays for other people and scores and plays defense. She plays great defense.
“She passes up shots sometimes for her teammates to make sure they score, but Liv knows she has the green light to get a bucket whenever she wants to. But her game is to make sure that she’s deceptive in terms of making sure other people touch the ball so you can’t figure out what she’s doing every time down.”
Esquivel embraces a pass-first approach.
“I’ve been getting the ball around a lot,” she said. “Ball-handling is my main job on the court, bring it down. I create good opportunities for everyone else as well as getting my own amount a little bit.
“I have more confidence overall this year, just being on the court in general, in everything I do. I feel like I’m more confident. I’m more used to it now.”
Ballard is in his first season as Griffith’s coach. But he said he has known Esquivel since she was in kindergarten. Ballard’s daughter Savannah is a junior at Highland.
“When they had the girls league up here, we used to play up here all the time,” Ballard said. “Our daughters even played AAU one year together in her father’s AAU program. So I’ve known Liv a long time.”
Esquivel is a team captain along with senior guard/forward Morgan Von Ogden and sophomore guard/forward Toni Escobedo.
“She has stepped up her leadership role this year, just making sure she talks to her teammates, getting them in the proper positions,” Ballard said of Esquivel. “And she’s communicating with me, like, ‘What do you need me to do out there?’ Although I’ve told her, ‘If you can read the defense, you can call the play.’
“I ultimately trust her at the end of games. She’s the one player I ultimately trust to have the ball in her hands because I know she’s going to make the right decision.”
Esquivel was a captain last season too.
“She’s really knowledgeable,” Von Ogden said. “If you have questions at all about basketball, whether it’s the rules or the best plays to be doing or even the best defense, she will have the answers. She’s just very knowledgeable.
“She’s also a very good leader. She won’t make you feel bad about asking a question. She’ll just explain it to you. She’s just a really good leader.”
Von Ogden is the lone senior on a roster that includes six freshmen.
“Whenever we’re doing drills or learning new plays, I try to do whatever I can,” Esquivel said. “If they have any questions, I’m always there to push them to go harder.
“We’re all really close to each other. That helps us a lot on the court. We jell really well together as a team.”
