Jacobs 'shoes' away Grayslake Central
Seniors Hailey Cnota and Sierra Dunner opened the Jacobs girls basketball season with a lot in common.
Each of the girls shared her shoes, wearing black and gold on one foot and white and gold on the other.
Cnota and Dunner also nearly split the line score Monday night, each sinking 5 field goals and going 6-for-6 from the free-throw line. The only difference? Cnota made three 3-pointers en route to scoring 19 points and grabbing 9 rebounds - while Dunner finished with 16 points.
Jacobs led from the start, never looked back and defeated host Grayslake Central 69-48 in a Fox Valley Conference crossover.
"Since freshman year, I wanted to have this kind of combo," Cnota said, "It just happens that Sierra and I wear the same shoe size. We both wanted to do it. We wanted to customize them the way that we did and we both want to do it for the entire season."
The Golden Eagles shot well from the field, going 22 of 39 (56 percent).
"Offensively, we did a lot of great things out there," said Jacobs coach Ed Haugens. "We hit our shots and our 3-point shot (4-for-5) was on tonight. The girls moved the ball pretty well and were unselfish."
Cnota scored 11 points in the opening quarter, hitting three 3-pointers to help the Golden Eagles lead 21-13 after eight minutes.
"It gave us a lot of momentum and a lot of people stepped up," Cnota added. "I've been working real hard staying after practice and it's paying off."
The Rams tried to rally in the second quarter and closed to 32-28 on Colleen Daly's short jumper with 1:25 left. But Jacobs' Melanie Schwerdtmann scored 4 of her 8 points during a 7-3 run that put the Golden Eagles ahead 38-31 at the break.
"Jacobs was a good team with five senior starters," said Rams coach Roger Lass. "We don't have any senior starters and it kind of showed. We had it down to 4 at one point. We had to expend a lot of energy to overcome it, and then Jacobs found a way to widen the lead more."
The Golden Eagles pulled away in the second half, as Dunner scored 14 of her 16 after intermission and Katy Cook added 10 points.
Maddy Miller led the Rams with 10 points, including a pair of 3-pointers. Rebekah Llorens added 9 points and 9 rebounds.