Benilde-St. Margaret’s girls basketball coach Tim Ellefson knew the question was coming after his team advanced to the Class 3A basketball championship for the fourth consecutive season this week.

Ellefson’s face didn’t light up, though, with the thought of focusing on the rare four-peat.

“It’s really not about that,” said Ellefson, who hopes the No. 2 Red Knights (25-6) have what it takes to beat No. 1 Stewartville (29-1) in the title game on Saturday, March 14 at Williams Arena. “It is a special run but we have more work to do.”

Only one team has won four consecutive titles before in Minnesota girls basketball history, with Providence Academy doing so in Class 2A last year. So obviously the chance for BSM to make history was a hot topic. Not so much for the coach.

“This team is just trying to win one. It’s a different team,” Ellefson added. “We do rely on some of that past experience, but it’s really not about the fourth one. It’s really about this year. Some kids in this locker room have never been here before.”

Junior starters Pressley Watkins and Sydney Friedly looked over at their head coach and nodded their heads on Thursday as if they understood the mentality. Don’t look ahead.

The Red Knights, seeded second in the bracket, are underdogs in Saturday’s final against Stewartville, a team on a 28-game winning streak that beat BSM 85-76 on Jan. 17.

The Tigers, who lost to BSM in the 2023 title game, are led by seniors Audrey Shindelar and Jayci Rath, who combined for 36 points in Thursday’s 65-51 semifinal victory over No. 4 seed Cretin-Derham Hall.

Shindelar and Rath are going to play Division I college basketball next season, Shindelar at South Dakota State and Rath at St. Thomas.

That’s similar to what BSM looked like last year, led by Zahara Bishop, who now plays at Seton Hall, and Kendall McGee, who is at Creighton. Not this time around.

“We’ve been such a different team all the years I’ve been here,” said Watkins, who had 21 points in BSM’s 71-59 semifinal victory over No. 3 Marshall on Thursday. “We’re really young but we make up for it with our talent. As a team we’ve worked so hard for this ... put blood, sweat and tears into this to prove that it’s not necessarily the players we have, it’s the program.”

Putting more pressure on the moment with the record and making history could make the title game a bit overwhelming for inexperienced players. Watkins and Friedly are in bigger roles now but have been here before.

“We lost a lot of big names,” Watkins said. “And a lot of people did overlook us at the beginning of the season.”

Three years ago, current Michigan star Olivia Olson had 19 points and 17 rebounds to lead BSM to the 2023 Class 3A title, and she followed it up with 30 points to pull off the repeat in 2024.

Last season, BSM’s Bishop and McGee combined for 33 points in a 73-57 victory over Marshall in the Class 3A championship.

“We always felt a sense of like safety behind having [Bishop, McGee and graduated senior Kate Kapsner], knowing they’d get their energy up,” Watkins said. “But this year is so different. We have to bring each other up. No one is going to be a superhero.”

This season, Watkins, the state’s No. 2-rated Class of 2027 prospect, is the leading scorer at just under 14 points per game. There’s more balance with production on different fronts.

Friedly, also a top volleyball prospect, can have some hot-shooting games, like her 25 points in the Class 3A, Section 6 semifinal victory over Delano. Junior Alivia Bell and senior Mira Wismer lead the team respectively in passing, rebounding, steals and blocks.

The Red Knights rely also on underclassmen. Sophomore Zaida Jenkins had 25 points in the upset of No. 1 seed Orono in the section championship. And freshman Kiera Willis had a team-high 19 points in the state quarterfinal win vs. Rock Ridge on Wednesday.

“Every year, it’s a new team for us,” Friedly said. “It resets and we’re like we’ll get this [championship]. And it doesn’t really have an effect on the past ones.”