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Young WW South shows progress

Winning is fun, but coaches really like to see their teams improve also.

Wheaton Warrenville South coach Rob Kroehnke saw a lot of improvement from his young Tigers in Thursday night's 48-23 victory against Glenbard East in Wheaton.

“We gained tonight,” Kroehnke said. “We did some really nice things. I thought we did a little bit better job of ball movement and people movement, which led to some nice passes. We moved the ball very well.”

In their DuPage Valley Conference opener, the Tigers (5-1, 1-0) did well right from the start, opening a 16-6 lead after one quarter of play, then making it 31-10 at halftime.

Kroehnke is going deeper into his bench than he has in previous seasons, and that's allowed him to adjust the Tigers' playing style. Instead of sitting back in a zone defense, the Tigers are extending the zone more and they're running more in transition.

“With the numbers that we have and the athletes that we have, we've got to extend. We just have to,” Kroehnke said. “Right now these kids just love to get up and go.”

Sophomore Allie Zappia led the Tigers with 9 points, and Kasey Gassensmith, Annie Shain and Meghan Waldron each had 8. Thursday's game was the varsity debut for Waldron, a freshman just cleared to play after recovering from an injury.

“We've got the legs to go 9-10 deep right now, and we're going to take advantage of it,” Kroehnke said. “The kids give me 100 percent all the time. The effort is there. We just have to clean up the little things. I like where we're at right now, but we've got a ways to go.”

Glenbard East senior Michaela Stranski led all scorers with 12 points, and Sarah Moylan had 8 for the Rams (0-6, 0-2).

“We've got a lot of young players on the team, kind of inexperienced and still learning how to play together,” Rams coach Nicole Miller said. “We're working on one possession at a time.”