Too much Crawford, Proviso East for Hoffman Estates

Hoffman Estates girls basketball coach Mike Nocella warned his players at halftime about Proviso East junior Ivory Crawford.

"I told them we've got to keep her from scoring," the veteran coach said.

But that has not been an easy task for anyone this season.

Sure enough, Crawford (15.6 ppg) fueled a big second-half rally that saw the Pirates make up a 9-point deficit with 1:28 left in the third quarter.

The 5-foot-8 junior scored 18 of her game-high 25 points in the final 16 minutes as No. 5-seeded Proviso East edged the No. 4 Hawks 42-37 for the championship of the Rolling Meadows Class 4A regional.

"We knew we had to cover her (Crawford)," said Hawks junior Jada Stotts, who led her team with 16 points. "But I give her all the credit. She's amazing.

"We let up for a second and that's when they came back. But I truly believe we left everything on the floor."

Trailing 27-18, the Pirates (24-4) took the lead for good at 33-31 when Crawford hit her second 3-pointer of the fourth quarter with 1:25 left.

She added 2 free throws with 1:08 left for a 35-31 lead.

Hoffman (21-8) got to within 37-34 when Stotts drove for layup with 21.9 seconds left and closed to within 38-37 after a 3-pointer by senior Kelsey Lukowicz with 8.6 seconds left.

After Proviso's Stacey Welch made 1 of 2 free throws, the Hawks had a last chance but turned the ball over in the back court with 5.4 seconds.

Crawford's 3-point play with 2 seconds left capped the scoring.

"Ivory is a big-time player," said Pirates coach Ezra PridGeon. "She has scholarships on the table from some major schools like Rutgers, Seton Hall and a lot of the Big Ten schools."

Lukowicz and junior Precious Ogunleye each chipped in 6 points for Hoffman, which graduates only two starters (Lukowicz and Megan Bernardoni).

"We are excited for next year," Stotts said. "But it's just hard to lose for our seniors. Kelsey and Megan were our captains and they held our team together. That's what is frustrating. Kelsey had that big 3-pointer at the end but we just couldn't quite come back."

A layup by Ogunleye, 3-pointer by Stotts and layup by freshman Destinee Young (off a nice bounce pass from Stotts) gave the Hawks a 7-0 lead.

They held the Pirates scoreless until Jaliria Wells hit a layup with 1:21 left in the first quarter.

"Defensively, we played our hearts out," Nocella said. "But we just couldn't get anything generated on offense. That kept them (Proviso East) in the game and sooner or later you know they're going to get a run. And they got it at the end when it hurt us."

Stotts scored 11 of her 16 in the second half.

"Hoffman is a scrappy team," PridGeon said. "They get to a lot of loose balls. We had to stop them from skipping the ball over our defense to the open person."

Nocella felt turnovers slowed down his team.

"One things I said is that we couldn't afford to turn the ball over," Nocella said. "We just had too many turnovers and gave them too many easy baskets because of it."

The Pirates never panicked when they trailed.

"All season, we've pretty much been a second-half team," PridGeon said. "At the half, we told the girls we didn't come here to lose. We told them Hoffman took its best shot at us in the first half and we were only down 5 (16-11). We just said we had to play smarter and play better defense. And we persevered."

"We just never gave up," Crawford said. "We communicated, believed in ourselves and just kept fighting for what we wanted."