Culligan, Spartans do it again at Lisle

Catherine Culligan and the St. Francis girls basketball team made the Lisle Holiday Cage Classic theirs once again.

The fourth-seeded Spartans repeated as champions of the 16-team tournament by handling unseeded Antioch 49-30 in the title game Saturday night.

Culligan, a 5-foot-7 senior guard, was named tourney MVP for the second straight year.

"We've always done very well in this tournament," Culligan said. "It's right by our school. We get pumped on the bus ride here. We knew we could come and win this tournament, so we did everything we could."

"Especially this game and last game, we've had a lot of players step up," St. Francis coach Leslie Fay-Dehn said. "It's not just one kid. Obviously Culligan did an awesome job in there, but we had a lot of contributions from many kids. That helps you win games."

St. Francis (9-7) controlled the game from beginning to end. The Spartans scored the first 7 points and stretched their lead to 13-2 on consecutive putbacks by Jenny Eldridge.

Antioch pulled within 21-15 on Andi Potkonjak's driving flip in the second quarter but then fell victim to a microburst of points by St. Francis junior guard Alex Morris.

Morris went on a personal 8-0 run on two putbacks, a 16-footer and a fastbreak lay-in over a 1:14 span to give the Spartans a 29-15 halftime advantage.

"I was just really aggressive and went for rebounds," Morris said.

"That was a huge run right before half," Fay-Dehn said. "It gave the kids that momentum I think they needed at that point."

The closest Antioch (7-8) came in the second half was 36-27 when Allie Anttila hit both ends of a 1-and-1 with 4:05 remaining.

The Spartans answered with a basket by Eldridge on a nice feed from Culligan and a Morris putback before scoring the final 9 points of the night.

Eldridge finished with a game-high 12 points. Culligan and Morris added 10 apiece.

Anttila's 8 points paced Antioch.

Sequoits coach Tim Borries was impressed by St. Francis' defense. The Spartans held his club to 24 percent shooting from the field and induced it into committing 23 turnovers.

"I didn't realize they were that long," Borries said. "For being undersized, we played hard."