Wicinski leads short-handed Geneva's 2nd-half surge

Lauren Wicinski faced a daunting challenge.

The Geneva girls basketball team was without the services of Emily Hinchman (hamstring); starting forward Kelsey Augustine was saddled with foul problems all game, and Neuqua Valley held Taylor Whitley in check throughout the first half.

But Wicinski scored 16 points and hauled down 18 rebounds as the Vikings broke free from a halftime deadlock to extend their season-long unbeaten streak to 22 games with a 63-38 victory over Neuqua Valley Tuesday night in Geneva.

The Wildcats fell to 9-13.

The Vikings' 54-26 advantage in rebounds was the main story line of the nonconference game; Wicinski had 8 of the Vikings' 20 third-quarter rebounds to power the hosts to a 40-29 lead after three quarters.

"I didn't know I had that many (rebounds)," said Wicinski, who had 10 boards on the offensive end. "We kept missing our simple shots. We were more patient (in the second half). It was intense."

"(Wicinski) carried us on her shoulders and kept us in the game," Geneva coach Gina Nolan said. "That's the most aggressive team we've seen this year defensively."

Neuqua Valley was inexorable at the defensive end in the opening quarter, forcing the Vikings into a miserable 3-for-17 effort from the field to open the game.

The Wildcats maintained their lead into the second quarter, and Danielle Davis' inside score gave Neuqua Valley its second 6-point spread of the game at 21-15.

But it was all Geneva over the final 20 minutes of play.

Wicinski capped an 8-2 second-quarter-closing run to knot the game at 23-23 at the break, and Geneva scored the first 7 points of the third quarter behind star guard Whitley.

The Indiana State-bound four-year starter was constant motion on the Vikings' offensive end, but the Wildcats harassed Whitley into missing 10 of her first 13 shots.

But with Geneva dominating the glass at both ends, Whitley finally solved the Wildcats' unrelenting combination of traps and man-to-man by scoring 18 of her game-high 25 points after the intermission.

Exploiting the Wildcats' over-the-limit foul situation five minutes into the third quarter, Whitley was 12-for-14 from the free-throw line in the second half.

"We haven't faced anything like that (defensively) all year," Whitley said. "Every point we made we earned."

Geneva outscored Neuqua Valley 23-9 in the fourth quarter to distort the teams' competitiveness.

"There was one possession where we counted 5 (Geneva) rebounds," Neuqua Valley coach Mike Williams said. "We let it get away in the second half. We've got the talent; it's just a matter of putting it together. We're young, but the time has to come where we start to grow up."

Morgan Williams drained four 3-pointers to pace the Wildcats' scorers with 14 points, and freshman Becky Williford added 11.