Elgin falls twice at Burlington

In Saturday’s final game at the Burlington Central girls basketball Thanksgiving tournament, Belvidere North downed Elgin, 65-20.

The Maroons played decently in spurts, but couldn’t handle the Thunder’s transition game. Belvidere used the fast break, and Elgin’s cold shooting, to take a 24-8 lead at intermission. The Thunder really turned on the afterburners after the break, outscoring the Maroons 29-4 to lead 53-12 before coasting in the fourth quarter.

Playing its third game in 2 days with a short bench, Elgin just couldn’t keep up.

Briana Hamilton led Elgin (0-4) with 14 points and 7 rebounds, but no other Elgin player scored more than 2. Jessica Ramirez added 5 boards for the Maroons.

“I thought our half court defense was pretty good,” said Elgin coach Dr. Nick Bumbales. “We got beat a lot in transition offense, and we didn’t do too bad of a job rebounding.”

Belvidere North led 11-0 before the Maroons, who have now lost 32 straight, got on the scoreboard on Hamilton’s jumper with 1:43 left in the first quarter. Hamilton scored all of the Maroons’ 8 first-half points.

Kristen Larson led the Thunder’s balanced attack with 17 points, and added 8 rebounds. Alexa Adams had 14 points off the bench, and Katie Dovenmuehle added 10 for Belvidere, which won its second game of the day after beating Marengo earlier.

Harlem 56, Elgin 28: In its first game of the day the Maroons were outscored 22-8 in the second half in falling to Harlem. Briana Hamilton led Elgin with 12 points and Maggie Powers added 6.