Waubonsie Valley holds off furious Naperville Central rally for DVC victory
It was a third quarter to remember Friday night for Waubonsie Valley guard Maya Pereda.
Going up against visiting Naperville Central, the freshman had 3 steals and scored all 13 of her points in the period, leading a full-court press that saw the Warriors open a 22-point lead.
Waubonsie Valley needed all of Pereda’s tallies and more to hold off a stunning rally by the Redhawks.
Paced by a game-high 34 points by Erin Hackett, Naperville Central closed to within 71-67 with a minute left in game.
The Warriors recovered and finished the game at the foul line in a 79-71 DuPage Valley conference girls basketball win.
Waubonsie Valley had previously defeated Naperville Central 66-30 on Dec. 1, so quite a turnaround for the Redhawks.
“We kept the pressure up, and we’ve been working on our press,” said Warriors sophomore guard Danyella Mporokoso, who finished with 28 points and 9 rebounds.
“I feel like having an understanding of (what we have to do) on the press helps us. We’re all on the same page as a team.”
Waubonsie Valley had 9 third-quarter steals to build the big lead after halftime, but Naperville Central wasn’t about to give in.
First the Redhawks went on a run and closed the gap to 62-53 with six minutes remaining after a 3 from Emily Moran.
The Redhawks (10-15, 2-4) kept pushing, and when Hackett sank her seventh 3 of the game with 1:01 left, the score was 71-67.
“It was intense,” Hackett said. “We got blown out by them last time so we really had a passion to win this game.”
Naperville Central couldn’t get any closer than 4 points as clutch free throws by Morokoso and teammates Hannah Laub and Maya Cobb closed the victory.
Adrianna Villanova added 15 points for the Redhawks while teammate Annabelle Kritzer had 5 points and 7 blocked shots.
Laub and Cobb each scored 12 for Waubonsie Valley (20-2, 6-0).
“We were trying to run them off the line,” Mporokoso said of the Warriors’ late-game defensive strategy. “We talked about that, but we didn’t exactly execute it.”
Mporokoso added that keeping the pedal to the metal helped her team’s cause Friday.
“We had beaten them before,” the sophomore said, “but we still had the mentality that we had to come out and go hard the entire game, and that helped us.”
In the opening contest of the boys/girls doubleheader, undefeated Waubonsie Valley trailed Naperville Central’s boys 24-18 with 4:08 left in the third quarter.
When the third-period buzzer sounded, however, the Warriors had rebounded to take a 32-24 advantage.
Waubonsie Valley’s Tre Blissett had a 3 and a driving layup at the end of the quarter, and the home team didn’t let up from there.
The Warriors (19-0, 6-0) outscored the Redhawks 12-3 down the stretch to score a 44-27 boys basketball win.
Tyreek Coleman paced Waubonsie Valley with 19 points.
“We just need to lock in, play defense,” Blissett said, “and come together as a team.”