Kaneland wins despite injury

When Katie Hatch went down with a leg injury early in Saturday's Western Sun Conference girls basketball game with Yorkville, host Kaneland lost more than just one of five starters.

Hatch, who has a suspected calf injury, means a lot to the way the Knights run their offense and with her out of the lineup, nothing went quite the way it was supposed to - except for the final score, which was a peachy 37-26 in Kaneland's favor.

"When we lost Katie Hatch, we were just kind of helter-skelter the whole night," Kaneland coach Ernie Colombe said. "I'm just happy to come out of here with a win. We had to shift some people around."

It took Kaneland (4-8, 1-3) nearly a half of basketball before it found its equilibrium offensively. The Knights surged late to build a 20-15 halftime edge. Yorkville (1-13, 0-5) struggled on offense equally as much as Kaneland, but never found a spark.

Kaneland gained the upper hand early in the third quarter, when it built a 29-21 lead. The Knights may have never found their offensive rhythm, but they never stopped playing solid defense. Despite scoring only 5 third quarter points, Kaneland still advanced its lead to 25-19 entering the fourth quarter.

"They were in a zone and (Hatch) is a key part of the zone offense for us," Colombe said. "When she went down, we had to shift somebody there. Then we shifted somebody to replace them, and we ended up with three of four players out of place. That kind of made us a little bit choppy at times."

Yorkville only hit 3 field goals in the second half. Alyssa Harbin scored 8 points to lead the Foxes and her basket early in the fourth quarter cut the lead to 25-23.

Kaneland took over from there. Andie Strang, whose 8 points matched Harbin for top scorer on the night, scored for Kaneland, and that was followed by a Chassidy Mangers basket. Mangers added 7 points for Kaneland, including three key fourth quarter free throws.

"We've still got stuff to work on defense," Colombe said.