Maine West stuns Prospect
Prospect girls basketball coach Martha Kelly did everything she could to freeze Maine West junior Ashley Collins.
But with the game on the line, the 6-foot Collins stood even taller, calmly sinking 2 free throws with one second left in the game, lifting Maine West to a 54-53 upset with over No. 16 Prospect in the opening game of the 29th Annual Charger Classic at Dundee-Crown Monday.
Kelly called back-to-back timeouts after Collins had snared an offensive rebound and was fouled attempting the game-winning putback. But Collins didn’t let the tactic sway her.
“I was so nervous. I just knew I had to concentrate and that I made to make them,” Collins said.
Collins then raced to other end of the floor and broke up a desperation heave by Prospect to send five-time champion Maine West to the tournament quarterfinals for the first time since 2007. The Warriors (4-9) will meet defending tournament champion Fenwick (10-3) at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday. Fenwick defeated St. Charles North 80-56 in the first round Monday.
The matcup will pit two of Illinois’ winningest girls basketball coaches against each other in Maine West’s Derril Kipp and Fenwick’s Dave Power. Between them they have over 1,500 career wins. Their teams have won 14 of the previous Dundee-Crown championships.
Even though Maine West had a 44-43 lead going into the fourth quarter, Prospect (9-5) jumped ahead early in the final period, then held a 51-48 lead with 1:54 to play after senior Maura Benson fed freshman Taylor Will for a layup. The Warriors got 2 free throws from sophomore Brittany Collins with 36 seconds left to make it 51-50 but Will scored again 12 seconds later to put the Knights back ahead by 3, 53-50. Two more Brittany Collins free throws with 12 seconds to go made it 53-52 and Prospect missed the front end of a bonus with 10 seconds left. Brittany Collins grabbed the rebound and Kipp called timeout to set up the game-winning play.
The play ran right but Amanda Hoye’s shot rimmed out. Ashley Collins grabbed the rebound, was fouled on the putback and after Kelly’s two timeouts, she won the game for Maine West.
“I just told her you’ve got two shots, just go shoot it,” Kipp said. “She hadn’t had a particulary good rebounding game up until then but that rebound she got was huge.”
Maine West led 16-9 at the quarter but Prospect took a 28-24 advantage into halftime.
“We struggled in the first half but coach Kipp talked some sense into us and we worked better as a team in the second half,” said Ashley Collins, who finished with 8 points, all in the second half, and 7 rebounds. “Second shots win games. We just had to box out better.”
Even though Prospect won the rebounding battle 42-36, Maine West won the second half 23-19.
“We’ve struggled rebounding all year,” Kipp said, “but today we did a pretty good job, especially in the second half. The fourth quarter has been bad for us. I’m happy we could actually put together a fourth quarter.”
Brittany Collins led Maine West with 22 points and 14 rebounds, while Alexia Prosperi added 11 points and Hoye had 8. Will had 14 points and 10 rebounds to lead the Knights. She scored all her team’s points in the fourth quarter. Christina Brucci added 13 points for Prospect and Jessica Petrovski had 8.
“We turned the ball over way too much in the first quarter,” said Kelly of her team’s 9 turnovers in the first quarter. “We made some bad decisions down the stretch and not getting the rebound at the end was crucial. But you have to give Maine West credit. They played hard the whole game.”