Rolling Meadows' seniors in tune for 20th win

Senior Clare Preissing has played in countless girls basketball games in the Rolling Meadows gym since her feeder basketball days.

She played in her final one on Tuesday night.

And what will she remember most?

A big bucket? a crafty assist?

No, forget basketball.

"Probably singing the national anthem," she said with a smile.

Preissing got called into action when the recording of the song would not work on the sound system.

"I've always said to my teammates as a joke that I wanted to sing it," said Preissing, who also plays volleyball and soccer. "When the opportunity came, I said 'I'm going to do it.' It was a great way to end my career playing in this gym."

And it was a great ending for the five Meadows seniors, who earned their 20th win with a 58-43 decision over Schaumburg in the second-place Mid-Suburban League crossover game.

Kyra Spiwak scored 11 of her game-high 13 points in the final 10 minutes.

"Kyra played a great floor game," said Meadows coach Ryan Kirkorsky. "She just let the game come to her."

Fellow seniors and starters Katherine Nolan (12 points), Morgan Campagna (11) and Kelsey Nallon (9) were the next highest scorers for Meadows (20-7).

Nallon and Nolan hit back-to-back 3-pointers to start the game, and the Mustangs were off and rolling to a 17-2 lead.

"Our five seniors have done that for us in a lot of games," said Meadows coach Ryan Kirkorsky. "They've gotten us off to a lot of great starts.

"These five seniors have meant so much to our program on and off the court. They started playing together in fifth-grade feeder. They had one more opportunity to play in front of their home crowd and I think they showed pretty well."

They showed their basketball skills, and in Preissing's case, her singing skills.

"It was really fun to go out and do that," she said. "All the girls were laughing. It was fun to see the all hyped up before the game."

And they stayed that way on the floor, making sure Schaumburg never got closer than 8 points once junior Alexa Davis (8 points) finished the first quarter with back-back 3-pointers for the 17-2 lead.

Nallon ended up with three 3-pointers.

"Kelsey knocked down timely shots throughout the game," said Kirkorsky, whose team connected for seven 3-pointers.

"It seemed every time we'd get a basket, they'd come back with a 3, so it was hard to close the gap," said Saxons coach Jacqie Storm. "They were pushing us out on offense and we were taking jumpers instead of driving the ball inside in the first half. At half, we talked about going to the hoop and being a triple threat."

The Saxons (15-12) were led by Mallory Gerber (9 points), Regina D'Orazio (8) and Victoria Aguirre (6).

Kendall Fredrickson's 8-footer got the Saxons to within 30-22 but Nallon answered with a 3-pointer to extend the lead back into double figures, where it stayed the rest of the way.

"It's great to finish our last home game with 20 wins," Preissing said. "We had won 19 each of the last two years so this was a goal of ours."