Wheaton North celebrates OT win at Lake Park
If it's good enough for the Chicago Cubs, it's good enough for Wheaton North's young girls basketball team.
The Falcons players and coaches celebrated a 55-52 overtime victory at Lake Park, the end of a busy week and a rare Friday-night game by putting on pajamas after the game for the bus ride back to Wheaton.
“It's just a fun thing to do, I guess,” Falcons senior Emmy Gryna said. “It worked out good.”
Gryna is the only upperclassmen in a Falcons starting lineup that features two freshmen and two sophomores. After a rough start to the season, they see progress in their two-game winning streak.
“It's a big step for us,” Gryna said. “We pride ourselves on defense, and obviously it was a battle the entire game. We were up and down. But we just want to keep taking steps forward, and this was a big step forward for us.”
For a while it looked like Lake Park would be the team to celebrate at the end. Four consecutive Carson Vance free throws put the Lancers (5-5, 2-2) ahead 48-43 with 32.4 seconds left in the fourth quarter.
“I kept telling (my teammates) not to think it was over then,” Gryna said. “You can always come back with fouls or things like that. I just told them, don't think it's over. Just keep your head in the game and play as hard as you can.”
The Falcons did just that. Sophomore Hannah Swider scored with 14.5 seconds to go, and Gryna hit a 3-pointer with three seconds on the clock to send the game to overtime.
“We hit some big shots when we didn't think we were going to be able to knock some shots down,” Falcons coach Dave Eaton said before putting a Superman onesie over his suit. “Emmy hit a huge one there to get us into overtime. We had three games this week. I felt like we were an NBA team.”
“It took a 24-foot 3-pointer to take it to overtime,” Lake Park coach Brian Rupp added. “Our girls did a nice job of executing, I thought. There were a couple of lapses that I'd like to get back. But credit (Gryna) for hitting that shot to put it in overtime. We just fell short.”
Swider got the Falcons (3-6, 2-2) off to a good start in overtime with a 3-pointer, but a Sarah Cillick free throw gave the lead back to the Lancers with 44.5 seconds left in overtime.
“We had opportunities to put them away a couple of different times. We couldn't get it done,” Rupp said.
“They played a great game,” Eaton added of the Lancers, “and we got lucky there to sort of come away and hit some big shots.”
The lead tilted back Wheaton North's way with 26.2 seconds left on another Swider basket, and Gryna added more distance between the teams when she stole the basketball and made two free throws with 6.5 seconds to go.
“They are really starting to grow,” Eaton said. “We talked about having a second chance those last four minutes in overtime, and Lake Park answered early. Our girls were resilient and battled back and gave us again a chance to win at the end and we made some shots just in time. Nothing like waiting till the last couple of seconds.”
Gryna finished with 21 points, including five 3-pointers, and Swider added 17 points and 6 rebounds.
Cillick's 21 points led Lake Park, with Jordan Bradley adding 13.
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