Burlington Central tops South Elgin for 5th straight win

Even after an exciting win on Friday night over Marengo to stay in contention in the Kishwaukee River Conference the Burlington Central girls basketball team still had plenty left in the tank for its Saturday afternoon matinee against visiting South Elgin.

The Rockets (19-3) rode a wave of momentum to a 54-34 nonconference win over the visiting Storm to extend their win streak to 5 games.

Sophomore Kathryn Schmidt led the way for the Rockets with 16 points and 14 rebounds. Elana Wells added 13 points, including three 3-pointers.

"Considering we were coming off such an emotional win (Friday) night I was impressed with our level of energy today," Central coach Mark Smith said. "And that's really been the case the last 4 or 5 games - is that our energy has really improved. It's always nice to step up in class against a bigger Class 4A school like South Elgin to see what we can do and I thought we played very well. They had a size advantage on us but we did a good job of boxing out on the boards. We came into the game in a great frame of mind and that's very important."

The Rockets had a 29-21 rebounding advantage.

The score was tied 12-12 after one quarter before the Rockets took control with an 11-0 run to start the second quarter to take a 23-12 lead. Schmidt and Wells started the run with back-to-back 3-pointers.

"We just got back to playing our game," Schmidt said. "Sometimes we start rushing things. We just slowed things down some and started moving the ball."

Twice the Storm (9-9) rallied back to within 5 points, but both times the Rockets had an answer. Back-to- back baskets again by Schmidt and Wells just before halftime halted a Storm comeback effort and kept the Rockets comfortably ahead 27-19 at the break.

Then again in the third quarter after South Elgin pulled to within 5 points the Rockets responded with a 15-1 run to pull away for good.

"I think we dealt with their pressure and just looked for openings," Schmidt said. "We are doing a good job of sharing the ball. We know we have five scoring threats on the floor all the time so we are patient when it comes to finding the open shot. Our rebounding has really improved a lot, too, and that has had a major impact."

Schmidt had 2 baskets and 4 free throws during the 15-1 run that sealed the deal for the Rockets.

"She's a real nice player with a quick release," Smith said. "Every team is paying a lot of attention to her now, but when we stay patient we can still get her open looks."

The Rockets were without their top defender Reili Gardner, who was away on another school related activity. Zoe Kolhoff filled in nicely to hold South Elgin's top scoring threat Catora Brown to just 8 points.

Brown was back in the lineup after missing the last week with a sprained ankle.

Miah Galvin had 9 points to lead South Elgin in scoring.

"We knew coming in they were a really good team," South Elgin coach Dan Mandernack said. "We wanted to use this game as a barometer to figure out what we still need to work on. Even though we lost by 20 it didn't feel like it was by that much. I saw a lot of encouraging things. I really liked the way we were able to break the press and score off it. But like we have done all year we went through some scoring droughts and that really hurt us."