Burlington Central beats West Aurora for 20th win
Twenty wins still means something to Mark Smith.
So does playing your best basketball late in the season.
His Burlington Central Rockets accomplished the former Saturday afternoon at Kaneland's fifth annual Kristina M. Colombe Hoops for a Cure Shootout while taking another step toward the later as well.
Elana Wells scored 17 points to lead four Rockets in double figures in a 58-43 victory over West Aurora, improving to 20-7 for a second consecutive 20-win season.
"I don't know if the girls realize that's a big deal," Smith said. "That's huge. If you look around the state and look at records, a lot of teams don't win 20 games. We didn't really talk about it but we'll talk about it this week when we get back to practice. To me that's a huge deal."
West Aurora (20-9) led just once, 2-0 when Dajour Miles opened the scoring before the Rockets took control early with a 9-0 run.
Wells tied it with a layup, Kathryn Schmidt cut from the wing through the lane to score, Wells threw ahead to Zoey Kollhoff for a fastbreak layup, and Reili Gardner grabbed an offensive rebound and kicked out to Wells for a 3-pointer and 9-2 lead.
The Rockets led 21-12 after one quarter and 33-22 at halftime, capping the second quarter on Kollhoff's 3-pointer from the top of the key in the final seconds.
West Aurora never got closer than 7 points in the second half as the Rockets followed last Saturday's win over Sycamore with another quality victory. They learned their postseason draw this week which could include a matchup with Glenbard South, third in state last year with 6-foot-2 returning all-stater Maggie Bair, in the finals of the Class 3A Plano regional.
"It's good we're getting these wins and scoring a lot and stopping them on defense because it's preparing us for regionals. Hopefully we can keep it up," said Schmidt, who had 11 points including a couple pullup jumpers, 8 rebounds and a blocked shot in her third game back from a knee injury.
"I'm so happy to be back," Schmidt said. "It's (the knee) good, I just feel it from time to time. I felt it when I fell on the ground (while getting fouled Saturday)."
Lilly Moretti added 12 points, Kollhoff finished with 10 points, 5 rebounds and 2 steals, and Wells added 4 steals while going 8 for 8 at the free-throw line. The Rockets were 19 for 22 as a team. Gardner went 4 for 4.
Keva Tomas scored 13 points, Miles had 12 and Olivia Vanderwoude played strong inside with 10 points and 8 rebounds for the Blackhawks.
"It's the consistency we have to be able to maintain looking in to those players," West Aurora coach Teresa Waldinger said of her team's inability to continually capitalize down low.
"They (Burlington Central) are a very tough team. Their 3-pointers we came in hoping to defend them and had a really hard time. And our shots weren't falling (17 for 48, 35.4 percent)."