Hampshire handles Burlington Central
Sometimes 5 minutes is enough.
Hampshire scored 18 straight points during a brilliant stretch in the first quarter, then thwarted a Burlington Central comeback attempt before pulling away for a 59-32 victory in the semifinals of the Class 3A Hampshire girls basketball regional Wednesday night.
The Whip-Purs (16-14) will play Woodstock North (17-12) for the regional title Friday at 7:30 p.m. The Blue Thunder downed Crystal Lake Central 44-38 in Wednesday's second semifinal. Hampshire and Woodstock North split their two games during the regular season.
Michelle Dumoulin scored 21 points to lead the Whip-Purs in Wednesday's win. Sara Finn added 12 and Jennifer Dumoulin 10 for Hampshire.
Alison Colby scored 11 points and Brenda Thasavong 10 for the Rockets, who finished 13-16.
After Thasavong gave the Rockets their only lead of the night at 2-0, Hampshire scored the next 18 points. Each of the Dumoulins scored 6 points during the run.
"It's all about coming out with some confidence, and that helped build the confidence right there," said Hampshire coach Ed Haugens. The Whips kept the pressure up on both ends of the court.
"We did an excellent job on our defense, we had girls anticipating, especially our bottom girls, they did an excellent job of getting those steals," said Michelle Dumoulin. "We kept pushing the ball and passed the ball ahead. It worked out very well for us tonight."
Hampshire's defense harassed the Rockets into 28 turnovers. Full court pressure particularly bothered the Rockets during the big run, but Hampshire's defense was "nothing different from we usually do: running around helter-skelter and hopefully pick something off," according to Haugens.
Burlington got as close as 13 points in the third quarter, but Finn scored back-to-back buckets to cap a 10-0 run that put Hampshire firmly in control again.
"The whole thing we've been working on this season is being patient on the offense, and tonight we were a little bit rushed," said Central coach Jenna Real. "You can see it in the turnovers. We just struggled to slow down. Once we broke through the press, we just couldn't get into our offense and we kept forcing things."
Still, Real sees the program heading in the right direction.
"We've got a bright future ahead of us," she said.
Offensively, the Whip-Purs shared the ball with 15 assists. Michelle Dumoulin had 4. The Whips outrebounded the Rockets 26-13, with Tiffany Bentley grabbing 7.