Cary-Grove knocks off Lake Zurich
It takes a lot to satisfy a Cary-Grove sports team. Success has a way of doing that to a school.
So while his Trojans beat Lake Zurich 52-39 Tuesday night at the Dundee-Crown Thanksgiving Tournament to move to 4-1 on the season, Cary-Grove coach Rod Saffert says there's a whole lot of room for improvement for his 8-player squad.
“We're not pleased with the overall effort,” Saffert said. “We have to show more desire and hustle and we have to go rebound. I'm not questioning my girls' desire, we just have a lot of work to do.”
A 15-0 run that ended the first quarter and extended into the second told the tale of this game. Cary-Grove and Lake Zurich were tied 8-8 when the Trojans, who bounced back from their first loss of the season to Fremd on Monday night, had five different players contribute to the game-changing explosion. It started with 2:20 left in the first when sophomore Joslyn Nicholson scored, and ended with 7:48 left in the half when Paige Lincicum hit a short jumper. In between, junior Jennifer Perkins nailed a 3-pointer, junior Alyssa Lee added a bucket and senior standout Claire Jakubicek hit back-to-back hoops. With 7:48 left in the half, the Trojans had a 21-8 lead.
“That big run at the end of the first quarter was all the difference,” said Lake Zurich coach Chris Bennett, whose team dropped its first game of the season and is now 4-1. “(Cary-Grove) makes you do a lot of things you don't want to do and they made us turn the ball over a lot.”
To witness, the Bears had 26 turnovers 13 in each half while Cary-Grove coughed it up just 15 times.
Lake Zurich would cut the lead under 10 just twice the rest of the way as the Trojans kept up the pressure on defense and used a balanced offense that revolved around Jakubicek's scoring to keep the lead in double digits most of the night.
“Our team has improved since the beginning of the season,” said the Northern Illinois-bound Jakubicek, who finished with 21 points, 8 rebounds, 7 steals and a blocked shot and is now just 29 points away from tying Eve Barry's school career scoring record of 1,232.
“Obviously there are still things we need to work on but we have confidence in each other.”
Jakubicek also doesn't see the small roster hurting her or her teammates.
“We all get along really well so I don't think it's a deterrent,” she said. “We all get more playing time and that makes it a complete team effort.”
And about that pursuit of the school scoring record? “I don't even know what it is,” Jakubicek said. “I think my mom does but I don't.”
Lincicum scored 9 points for the Trojans, who were 19 of 49 shooting.
Junior Cathryne Spear had 11 points to lead Lake Zurich, which shot a decent 16 of 42 and outrebounded the Trojans 30-21.
““I'm very happy with our first five games,” Bennett said. “Cary-Grove's a solid team.”