Wheeling starters put in hard day's night
NORMAL - The Wheeling girls basketball team faced a daunting task in its initial visit to the state finals on Friday night at Redbird Arena.
The Wildcats' opponent, Bolingbrook, was as battle-hardened as Wheeling was green.
Bolingbrook was making its fifth consecutive downstate appearance, and Wheeling coach Shelly Wiegel used a novel approach against the Raiders.
The Wildcats' starters played the entire game until Bianca Szafarowicz fouled out with 2:01 remaining.
With its envious blend of hard-nosed man-to-man defense, underclass brilliance and experience, Bolingbrook advanced to its fourth straight title game by upending the Wildcats 53-40 in the first Class 4A semifinal at Illinois State University.
"I wanted to give us the best chance (to win)," Wiegel said. "(The starters') fatigue has never been a problem. All five of the kids are capable of playing 32 minutes. These are the five that got us here."
Ashley Wilson, Bridgette Gray, Janelle Cannon, Stephanie Kuzmanic and Szafarowicz took the floor at the outset and had few breathers over the course of the game.
"I had to play like I just came into the game," said Szafarowicz, who paced the Wildcats with 13 points. "We couldn't be tired out there. Towards the end I was starting to feel it."
Three of the Raiders' starters also played the entire contest, and none of the four combined reserves who saw action scored.
Bolingbrook coach Anthony Smith credited a strenuous off-season conditioning and weight program that proved to be the difference.
"When it comes to conditioning, we can play with the best of them," Smith said.
The marquee matchup of the night was between Purdue-bound Wheeling senior forward Ashley Wilson vs. Bolingbrook freshman sensation Morgan Tuck.
The Raiders collapsed on Wilson at every opportunity, and the paint was as congested as the Kennedy Expressway on a late Friday afternoon.
Wilson was limited to a single field goal in the opening half, and the suffocating Raiders defense held the Wildcats' star to half of her regular-season average with 9 points.
Wilson did have a game-high 12 rebounds and blocked a pair of Bolingbrook shots.
"It was something I have been waiting for since freshman year," Wilson said of Illinois' grandest stage. "They pushed me out of the (lower blocks)."
Tuck enhanced her burgeoning status by leading all scorers with 18 points.
Bolinbrook also applied a different strategy against Szafarowicz after the junior tallied 11 of her team-high total before the intermission.
"In the first half I was giving them a lot of trouble," Szafarowicz said. "In the second half they were paying more attention to me."