Cary-Grove 60, Crystal Lake South 47
The Cary-Grove girls basketball team is leaving little doubt as to who is the team to beat in the Fox Valley Conference Valley Division race this season.
Friday night, the deep and talented Trojans stayed perfect in league play, using a balanced team effort to down defending Valley champ Crystal Lake South 60-47 at Gator Alley in Crystal Lake.
Senior Jamie Kuhl led the Trojans (17-3, 4-0) with 17 points while senior guard Liz Bart had 16 and senior standout Danielle Smith, playing with a sore ankle, 12.
"That's the hard part about playing our team," said C-G coach Rod Saffert. "It's someone different every night."
The talent and depth the Trojans possess wasn't lost on South coach Kyle McCaughn.
"That's a real nice team," McCaughn said of the Trojans. "They just get after every ball and every rebound. They make you work for everything you get.
"I've been lucky the last couple years to be on that end, to have kids that will do whatever it takes to win. We've still got that, we just came up a little short tonight."
Cary-Grove established itself early, racing to a 16-5 lead after one quarter with Smith and Bart each scoring 7 points.
"I told the girls we'd have to survive their runs and they'd have to survive our runs," said Saffert. "We just put it in the basket more than they did."
That the Trojans did. They were 19 of 35 from the field in the game, including 5-for-5 in the fourth quarter, a period in which they sealed the win by making 11 of 14 from the free-throw line down the stretch.
Cary-Grove led 27-17 at halftime but the Gators (13-7, 2-2) went on a 7-0 run to make it a 27-24 game after 2 free throws by Carly Juliano with 4:58 left in the third.
But just like that, C-G came down on a breakaway and 2 free throws by Kuhl stopped the South run and sent the Trojans on an 8-0 blitz of their own and a 35-24 lead.
The Gators never got closer than 7 the rest of the way, thanks in large part to Kuhl scoring 10 of her 17 points in the first 4 minutes of the fourth quarter.
"I was just getting open and (her teammates) were feeding me the ball," said Kuhl. "When we play together we win together. We've got a great bench and we came ready to play tonight."
Katie Burton led South with 10 points while Caitlin Mize added 9 and Michelle Gaede 8.
The loss puts the Gators' backs against the wall somewhat in terms of defending their conference title.
""I( thought going in 8-2 would get you a tie and 9-1 would win it outright," said McCaughn. "Cary-Grove has got themselves set up perfectly."