Glenbard West falls to Oak Park

It was a week Glenbard West's girls basketball team would rather forget.

The Hilltoppers followed a loss to Proviso West on Thursday with a 45-43 loss to Oak Park on Saturday night in Glen Ellyn.

Saturday's game started well for the Hilltoppers (5-2, 1-2 West Suburban Silver), who took an 11-4 lead over Oak Park (1-7, 1-1) after the first quarter. That lead nearly evaporated, however, into a 19-18 halftime margin.

"It was disappointing," Glenbard West coach Mike Hofland said. "We fell apart in the second quarter. We stopped playing aggressive defense and we stopped moving on offense. The fourth quarter we started moving and getting better looks and attacking the basket and we played good pressure defense.

"I'm not happy with the effort that I'm getting because our offense and defense is predicated on pressure, pressure, pressure, and I've only got one or two kids asking to come out. Something's wrong. That means some kids are going hard and other kids aren't going hard enough, and it's my job to find out who's going to go hard all the time."

It didn't help that the Oak Park press turned the matchup into a helter-skelter game, forcing 27 Glenbard West turnovers for the game, 9 in the second quarter.

"That's the best thing for us," Oak Park coach Bob Biggins said. "That's what we always hope for."

The game stayed even the rest of the way, with the Hilltoppers taking a 40-37 lead on Abby Keirnan's three-point play with 2:56 left in the fourth quarter. But Oak Park's Illinois State-bound guard, Stekara Hall, scored a pair of baskets to give the Huskies a lead they never gave up.

"We just didn't finish and they put the ball in their best player's hand and she came through," Hofland said.

"We tried our hardest at the end, but none of our shots were really falling," Keirnan added of the Hilltoppers' 17-of-55 shooting for the game.

Hall led Oak Park with 18 points, and Caroline Kelty added 13.

Caitlin Soane and Claire Riley scored 11 apiece for the Hilltoppers.