Wheaton Academy swarms Spartans

Wheaton Academy talked in the halftime locker room about coming out and making a statement in the third quarter.

St. Francis heard that statement loud and clear.

The Warriors hung a 62-47 loss on the Spartans on Saturday afternoon in a nonconference game in West Chicago.

Leading by 7 at halftime, the Warriors (6-0) started the second half on a 12-2 run, and a Jenn Lee three-point play later sent the margin over 20 with 2:40 to play in the third. Lee scored 12 of her game-high 17 points in the period.

"The third quarter's haunted us all year. It's tough," St. Francis coach Leslie Fay-Dehn said. "The shots started falling for them, and we weren't getting back on defense."

Junior guard Alexa Sharkey added 15 points, 5 assists and 5 steals for the Warriors, and her freshman sister, Sydney, tormented St. Francis (1-5) with three 3-pointers.

"The younger Sharkey got hot a little bit. We scouted out (Lee) and thought she was going to get a lot of shots, and they were hitting all over," Fay-Dehn said. "They're tough. They're a tough ballclub."

Meanwhile, 6-foot juniors Meghan Grant and Kristine Egebrecht did the dirty work down low, combining to grab 21 rebounds.

"It was great," Lee said. "Lexi and Sydney and Meghan and Kristine and I were all on fire in the third quarter. It was great."

"They crash the boards. I've seen Wheaton Academy play and I told our kids that, and they just weren't getting bodies on those kids," Fay-Dehn said. "You give them 2-3 shots, and they're going to start to make it."

"We started controlling the boards better, our offensive transition was much better in the third quarter," Wheaton Academy coach Beth Mitchell added. "We got some looks in transition. And I think we got some 3s to go down that we weren't hitting in the first half."

Jaime Stefely led St. Francis with 13 points, and Kelly Reinke added 10.