Wheeling and dealing Wildcats down Prospect

This was clearly Wheeling's Knight.

The state-ranked Wildcats girls basketball team did little wrong in coasting to a 71-48 victory over the visiting Prospect Knights, who came into the game with a 13-4 record.

Everything seemed to go the way of the two-time defending Mid-Suburban League champions, who improved to 18-2 and 3-1 in the MSL East, 1 game behind Hersey (4-0).

One prime example was when the Wildcats missed a shot the final seconds of the first half and senior guard Selma Smajlovic pulled the ball out of the air and scored a nifty reverse layup as the buzzer sounded to give her team a 41-20 halftime cushion.

"We wanted to come out strong because a lot of times we've been flat to start games," said Smajlovic, who earlier in the half, while in a crowd under the basket, took a nifty seeing-eye pass from Janelle Cannon and converted a layup.

"You always have to expect that from Janelle," Smajlovic said. "Sometimes, you don't even know she sees you and the ball comes right to you."

Cannon saw the court and the basket well all night, scoring a game-high 20 points with 10 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals and 2 blocked shots.

Bianca Szafarowicz (four 3-pointers) added 16 points with 4 steals, 3 assists and 3 rebounds, and Stephanie Kuzmanic tossed in 11 points with 3 rebounds and 2 assists.

"This feels real good," said Szafarowicz, the Truman State recruit who got to play in her future collegiate state when the Wildcats won a Springfield, Mo., tourney last week. "We had a lot of momentum from the Missouri tourney (3-0 with all convincing wins) playing ranked teams from other states."

Two free throws by junior Marissa Pettenuzzo drew the Knights (13-5, 2-2) to within 8-6 - but Wheeling took off on a 26-6 run, highlighted by many fastbreak buckets.

"We practice fastbreak drills," said Kuzmanic, who also dropped in a pair of 3-pointers. "Our defense creates a lot of offense."

"We know we're not as big as a lot of teams, so we like to push the ball up the floor," added Cannon, who had 18 of her 20 points in the first half and was 8-for-9 at the free-throw line.

"We just talk about taking what a team gives you," said Wheeling coach Shelly Wiegel, whose Wildcats have won 10 straight games. "We want to be aggressive but patient, too. I thought it worked out really well. We didn't want to force anything."

Wiegel played 15 girls as Kellie Kuzmanic added 8 points with 3 rebounds. Chloe Majkowski, Amanda Greiter, Ellie Grinter, Kayla Jordan and Leah Malsom all contributed points.

Senior Rachel Hunt led Prospect with 10 points and 6 rebounds. Lexi Glennon and Sarah Hunt (scored game's first 4 points) each added 9.

"Wheeling does a very good job on defense and a good job on the boards," said Prospect coach Martha Kelly. "We didn't handle their pressure well and we didn't rebound well."