Mporokoso nails game-winner to beat Neuqua, keep Waubonsie in DVC lead
The game and the DuPage Valley Conference title were on the line, but there was no need for Waubonsie Valley coach Brett Love to call a timeout at the end of Thursday’s girls basketball showdown in Aurora against rival Neuqua Valley.
The coach trusted his sophomore star Danyella Mporokoso and she proved him right, driving the lane for a winning layup with three seconds left on the clock, breaking a tie and giving her team a 62-60 win and its first DVC crown in Love’s seven-year tenure at the school.
The Warriors entered play 25-2 overall and 8-0 in the DVC, including a 1-point win at second-place Neuqua Valley earlier this year. The Wildcats (17-10, 7-2) had erased a 31-23 deficit at the half to draw even at 46-46 after three quarters, and then took a 58-57 lead late on a 3-pointer by Nalia Clifford.
From there the final 2 minutes went back and forth with each team taking its best shot. Freshman Maya Preda hit a huge 3 for the Warriors with 1:26 left to play for a 60-58 lead, and Wildcats guard Clifford made a great move around a defender for a layup to tie the score at 60-all and set the stage for Mporokoso’s winning drive that gave her 30 points on the night and her first conference title.
“I was just like, I gotta talk the last shot. Coach told me before the game, it’s going to come down to that — you’re going to have to make a shot,” said the sophomore, who connected on five 3s in the game. “I’ve been preparing for that last shot all season. It came up and I felt prepared and ready. But it hit the backboard and I was like please go in, please go in.”
Love, whose team has had a special season so far including a pair of holiday tourney titles, was confident in his leader in the final seconds. In fact, he was content letting his players do their thing for most of the final quarter.
“In the fourth quarter I was just sitting there. I wasn’t having to say anything,” said Love. “They were making all the right reads, and rotations. They (Wildcats) made some tough shorts. Those are things we have to live with. But we were matching shot for shot.”
Then came the final possession.
“This is the kind of player she is,” he said of Mporokoso. “Before the game I told her there is going to be a moment where she has to take the last shot. I didn’t know if it would be this game or the next or whenever, but I told her she was going to have to do that.
“That’s one reason why I didn’t call timeout. I didn’t have to draw anything up … I looked at her and I knew she had it. She made a pass, got the ball back and she made a good decision.”
It was a solid team effort by the Warriors, with Preda, Hannah Laub, and Lily Newton all knocking down big 3s, while Newton and Arianna Garcia also came up big on the glass, combining for 15 rebounds.
Newton’s 3 in the fourth quarter tied the score at 52-52 after Caitlin Washington had given the Wildcats a 3-point lead early in the fourth quarter with a long jumper. Washington led Neuqua with 19 points while Clifford added 16 and Kylee Norkus had 14 points and 7 boards.
“We knew this was going to be a tough game. We knew they were not going to back down,” Newton said. “This was more about us and our composure. The last game [against them] we were in the exact same spot … they came back, and we almost lost it. That was our focus for this game.”
Even in defeat, Clifford and the Wildcats felt good about their effort on Thursday and their confidence going forward from here.
“It’s tough. But it was nice to see us come back and battle,” Clifford said. “It definitely could have been a much worse loss with the way they were shooting, and to see us match it was exciting. When the game ended, I didn’t even feel tired. That was the loudest crowd on both sides I think we’ve had all year which is kind of cool.”