Lady Wildcats dominate Andrean 48-26 in Girls Basketball

A USA-365.com Special Report by Mark Smith
12-22-2011

ANDREAN (26) Brittany Gray 0-0-0, Madison Lesch 2-1-5, Sheyanne Irvin 3-4-10, Jessica Gray 1-0-3, Lauren Stazinski 2-1-5, Emma Farkas 1-0-2, Mady Mandich 0-1-1. TOTALS: 9 (7-9) 26.

HANOVER (48) Kristin Roper 0-5-5, Rylie Singleton 2-0-5, Tiphani Ward 3-0-7, Blayr Poston 8-9-28, Emily Blue 0-1-1, Frankie Turturillo 0-0-0, Katie Dominguez 0-0-0, Summer Pattison 0-0-0, Hannah Blue 0-0-0, Danielle Schwalm 0-0-0. TOTALS: 14 (15-25) 48.

FREE THROWS: ANDREAN (7-9, 77.7%) Irvin 4-4, Lesch 1-2, Staszinski 1-1, Mandich 1-2; HANOVER (15-25, 60%) Poston 9-11, Roper 5-10, Turturillo 0-2, Emily Blue 1-2.

3-GOALS: ANDREAN (1) Jessica Gray; HANOVER (5) Blayr Poston 3, Tiphani Ward, Rylie Singleton.

HANOVER CENTRAL 'Winter Classic'
Dec. 28-29 in Cedar Lake
Wednesday Dec. 28 (two gyms) QUARTERFINALS
HANOVER CENTRAL (7-2) vs. Bishop Noll (7-2) 11 a.m.
1A No. 4 Oregon-Davis (8-1) vs. Whiting (7-2) 11 a.m.

Wheeler (6-3) vs. Knox (2-8) 12:30 p.m.
2A No. 9 Bowman Academy (7-2) vs. 3A No. 15 Griffith (9-1) 12:30 p.m.

SEMIFINALS
HANOVER or Noll vs. Oregon-Davis or Whiting - 7:30 p.m.*
Wheeler/Knox vs. Bowman or Griffith - 7:30 p.m.

Thursday Dec. 28
FINALS
7th place game (in the Hanover Fieldhouse) 6 p.m.
5th place game (in the old HC gym) 6 p.m.
3rd place game (in the old HC gym) 7:30 p.m.
Tournament Championship game (main gym) 7:30 p.m.*

* - to be broadcast "live" on www.USA-365.com

Hanover (7-2) pulled away after halftime and warmed up for their eight-team holiday tournament with a 48-26 victory over the winless 59ers.

For Andrean and 17-year head coach Ken Markfull, it's a lost year. A couple of key players chose not play this year, leaving Markfull with an untested, shorthanded group. The 59ers, who have won four sectional titles in the class sports era, have lost nine games by 15 points or more. There are a couple of winnable games next month but the Niners could easily finish the regular season at 0-22.

"I'm already playing freshman," he said after last week's game at Hanover. "There really isn't anybody else. This is who we have. Will we win one? I sure hope so."

The Niners were close just before the half, but Blayr Poston sank six late free throws to give Hanover a 10-point lead on a quiet night in front of a very small crowd.

"We were four points behind," said Markfull, "and I called for one shot. We'll, we took one shot. With 19 seconds left. And they went to the other end and hit six free throws when we couldn't get the ball back up the floor. We should have been down four or six at worst at halftime. Are we trying? Sure, they are. But they're just having trouble doing what I tell them."

Hanover (7-2), coming off a 67-61 loss to Gary Roosevelt, started slowly but came on after halftime. It was obvious they were playing a 10-girl rotation to allow everyone to get in. The game was never really in doubt, but HC did have problems on offense the way they did against Roosevelt.

"We hadn't played for a while," said Hanover's Blayr Poston, who led all scorers with 28 points. "We shot a lot of threes, but if they come out to guard us it opens the middle some."
"We've been working on a lot of guard to post stuff. The (pick and roll) roller and the pass into the roller. We're just not doing it as much as we should be. None of us played as well as we can in that (Roosevelt) game. I know I didn't. They have one good player (Kelly Moten) and we couldn't stop her."

There's a feeling that while Hanover has played nine games, the season starts in full force in the expanded eight-team Hanover Central 'Winter Classic' this week. In the last decade, Hanover used to travel to Momence, Illinois for the a holiday tournament. Some teams don't play at all over the Christmas break but Poston would rather not do that.

"We'll be in our comfort zone," Poston said. "On our own floor. I'd like a few days off, but then we'd lose everything we'd built up. I think this (playing at home) might be best."

CAT NOTES: Hanover's Winter Classic is ready to go with seven teams coming in with winning records. The quarterfinal round is not totally predictable, but observers can hope for a semifinal between Hanover and state-ranked Oregon-Davis. The quarterfinal between Bowman Academy (7-2) and Griffith (9-1) is already guaranteed.

The intriguing off court aspect of the tournament will be the two-games-in-one day scenario Wednesday for all eight schools. Teams like Oregon-Davis and Knox (and probably Bowman Academy and Wheeler, who play at 12:30 p.m.) cannot go home between the quarterfinals and the night-time semifinals so they must find things to do and places to go at or near the Hanover campus. Somebody should warn the local "Subway."

Hanover has two gyms and a large field house so there's plenty of room for the games. If everybody can find a place to park (there will be eight teams from eight schools on site) no problems are expected inside the building.  One aspect of the format may be that the third place game and the championship game run simultaneously (7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 29) in opposite gyms at Hanover. The advantage is that the championship game will start on time at 7:30 p.m. because nothing else is being played in the main gym that day. The final day of the tournament will end on time. But the players who are playing for third place (and that could be Hanover) will not be able to see the final game while players in the fifth place and 7th place game (both 6 p.m. starts) will.

Hanover's Blayr Poston said she'd obviously like to have two weeks off over the holidays as teams like Lowell have, but there would be a problem when they came back.

"We'd be starting all over," she said. "We'd have forgotten everything we'd learned."

Poston was among those who were visibly ill in the Roosevelt game and tried to play through it.

"When I get to the point where I can't breathe out there," she said. "Then I want to come out. But other than that, I'll just let coach tell me when I come out. I don't really think about being sick while I'm playing."

Copyright © 2011 USA-365.com and Meyer Multimedia Services, a division of Meyer Broadcasting Corp.  All rights reserved.
Revised: December 28, 2011 .