Metea starts win with defense

Different girls stepped up at different times for Metea Valley on Tuesday night.

It all started, though, with Amira Turner's defense.

The Mustangs senior held Loyola-bound Becca Smith to 13 points well below her 21-point average in Metea Valley's 54-41 win over South Elgin in Aurora.

Smith managed just 2 points in the first half, when Metea ran out to a 25-10 halftime lead and only had 8 until the game's final minute.

Turner's work is nothing new to Metea coach Kris Kalivas. Turner kept Bartlett star Haley Videckis to 14.

"We'll take holding Becca Smith to 13 points any day," Kalivas said. "Amira's done that for us all year guarding the opponent's best player. She's got good size, good feet and she's a competitor. She steps up to the challenge."

Metea (4-5, 2-1 Upstate Eight Valley), which already has eclipsed last year's conference win total, only trailed once, at 2-0 a minute in.

The fast-starting Mustangs broke out to a 19-6 lead after a quarter. Bria Walker knocked down three straight 3-pointers to key the offense. Walker later hit a key 3 in the fourth quarter to stem a South Elgin rally.

"She knows she's a shooter," Kalivas said, "and she hit some big shots for us tonight."

South Elgin shot just 4 of 24 in the first half with 15 turnovers, Smith's lone scoring 2 free throws.

The Storm (6-3, 0-2) finally got it going in the third quarter and trailed 37-29 going into the fourth quarter. A pull-up jumper by Lania Robinson got South Elgin within 40-35 with 4:29 left, but it's as close as it got.

"We had a lot of unforced turnovers, and we didn't shoot the ball well," Storm coach Tim Pendergast said. "It was just one of those nights."

Megan Geldernick answered Robinson's jumper with a pair of free throws, and Walker hit a corner 3 off an inbounds play. Geldernick later made a gorgeous pass to Lori Obendorf for a layup.

"Megan and I, we seem to share a brain," said Obendorf, who was huge inside for Metea with 21 points and 11 rebounds. "Megan usually finds me when I'm open."

Obendorf didn't stop dishing credit.

"I definitely feel Amira did a wonderful job on defense tonight," she said. "A lot of times if we had a letdown it seemed like Amira would step up and make a play."

Obendorf scored 15 of her 21 points in the second half. Geldernick scored 7 of her 9 in the second half, and Turner complemented her great defensive work with 6 points and 8 rebounds.

"I don't think we're ever going to have one kid dominate for us," Kalivas said, "but we have good balance."

Savanah Uveges scored 11 points for South Elgin, which also surrendered 15 offensive rebounds to Metea.

"We were knocking on the door and I thought maybe we could sneak out with a win," Pendergast said, "but we didn't rebound well down the stretch. We were our own worst enemy tonight, not to take anything away from Metea."