Whitley's junior year: Decision is in

The list goes on and on for Taylor Whitley when it comes time to explaining why she chose Indiana State for her future college.

The star guard on the Geneva girls basketball team verbally committed to the Missourri Valley Conference school earlier this week, and was more than willing to reel off a list of reasons why she chose to be a Sycamore over other Division-I programs such as Northern Illinois, Eastern Illinois, Cleveland State and Bradley.

"I loved the coaches, and the head coach is really intense," said Whitley, who also factored in academics for one of the main reasons. "I got the chance to meet the team and they were really cool. They were all about basketball. (The Sycamore fans) get a lot of people at their games. They love the women's basketball team."

Indiana State is getting a quality player in Whitley, who has been on the All-Area team since her freshman year. She was the All-Area captain as a sophomore and averaged 18 points, 3.3 assists and 3.7 steals a game for the Vikings.She is the school's all-time scorer with 1,441 points.

Now, finally a senior, the 5-foot-8 Whitley doesn't have to worry about the big decision.

"It's so nice," she said. 'I can just go out and play. I'm really excited."

Geneva avenges 3 losses to Batavia: Taylor Whitley has produced several huge games in her three years with the Geneva girls basketball team, but Tuesday's performance was perhaps one of the biggest.

The junior guard scored 30 points, grabbed 8 rebounds and had 6 steals in a 69-50 win against rival Batavia in the Class 4A Bartlett regional semifinal.

"We talked before the game, and I encouraged her to relax and take it to them out there," Geneva coach Gina Nolan said. "She did that, and that's a credit to the incredible player she is on the offensive end and the defensive end."

With the win, No. 10 seed Geneva (21-6) will face No. 2 seed Schaumburg (26-5) in the regional final Thursday at 7:30 p.m. The Saxons beat Bartlett 73-50.

In the regular season, Batavia beat Geneva three times by a combined total of 13 points. All three games were close.

" (Winning Tuesday) just makes us feel so much better," Geneva guard Emily Hinchman said. "We played with a lot of confidence and did not want to lose to them again."

The playoff game, however, wasn't that close. The Vikings led by as much as 26 and jumped out to a 17-7 first quarter lead after Whitley scored the first 5 points of the game.

Batavia never took the lead, but was able to cut Geneva's lead to 32-27 at the half after going on a 9-2 run to close the second quarter.

"Off the get-go, we dug ourselves a hole," Batavia coach Tim DeBruycker said. "It was a 5 point game (at the half), a two possession game...all we had to do was execute in the third quarter and we just didn't...we dug ourselves back into a big hole."

Geneva, however, pushed its lead back up to double-digits for good after going on a 13-0 run in the middle of the third quarter. The Vikings ended up outscoring the Bulldogs 27-8 in that quarter.

The Vikings' largest lead of the game arrived with 5:36 remaining after a pair of Whitley's free throws.

In addition to Whitley, Hinchman finished with 17 points and 6 rebounds along with Kat Yelle's 10 points and 6 rebounds.

"(Whitley) had a pretty solid supporting cast tonight," Nolan said. "I'm really, really proud of my kids tonight. They played their hearts out."

"We never let down," Whitley said. "Everyone had key moments in the game. Everyone kept the momentum going."

Batavia, which capped its Western Sun Conference championship season 20-5, was led by Natalie Tarter's 17 points and 6 rebounds. Kara Lydon finished with 14 points.

"We just didn't do it tonight," DeBruycker said. "I don't mind losing when you put everything out on the floor, but I don't think we did that tonight."