Jacob, Dugalic spark Maine West past WW South

Maine West senior Jocelyn Jacob says that she has to be ready to contribute no matter what the circumstances are.

"What goes through my head is what should I be, what will my role be," said Jacob. "I can't be nervous, whether she (coach Kim de Marigny) puts me in or not, I have to be ready."

Thursday night against Wheaton-Warrenville South at the Schaumburg Thanksgiving Invite, Jacob came off the bench in both the second and fourth quarters to deliver some key buckets to squelch a Tigers comeback.

The Warriors' girls basketball team started quick and opened up an early 14-0 advantage, succumbed to a WWS rally and gave up the lead, then came back to score a 61-49 win.

Six-foot-4 junior Angela Dugalic led Maine West with 25 points, 8 rebounds and 3 steals.

"You can't take anything away from Wheaton," said de Marigny. "They're well-coached and disciplined. Just because they got down, they weren't wringing their hands and saying it was over. They did their job."

Maine West took advantage of 11 WWS first quarter turnovers to lead 18-5 after eight minutes.

Then the Tigers rallied and when Ellery Fahey hit two second-quarter free throws, the score was 20-18 Maine West.

"We got rattled, "said de Marigny. "We didn't do what we needed to do with the ball. We panicked."

"We finally started to shoot the ball," said Tigers coach Rob Kroehnke. "We knew we could get back in it but they (the Warriors) are a really, really good team."

Clinging to a 2-point lead, Jacob stepped in and hit 2 key buckets, one a 3-pointer, to help Maine West extend the advantage.

"Jocelyn is quite a shooter," said de Marigny. "She's had some injuries so she hasn't been on the floor as much as we'd like, but she's trying to get back into game condition. There's definitely some things she can do on the court to help us."

WWS took the momentum back in the third quarter thanks to three 3-pointers from senior Mira Emma, and took its first lead at 42-40.

Then Jacob connected from 3-point range twice early in the fourth to give the energy and the lead back to Maine West.

The Warriors opened an 11-point advantage on a 15-foot jumper from Rachel Kent, and WWS couldn't catch up.

"You can't give them (Maine West) that big of a lead," said Kroehnke of the Warriors' 14-0 beginning. "But at the start of the fourth quarter, we were tied, we were back in the game. It still comes down to taking care of your possessions, and we had three possessions late where we didn't get the shots we wanted, then they come down and hit some shots and it's an eight-point lead just like that."

Emma led WWS with 16 points while teammate Maria Dohse contributed with 8 points

Jacob scored 13 for the Warriors.

"In practice I try to hit as many shots as I can," said Jacob. "What you do in practice carries over into the games."

Kent added 10 points for Maine West, 6 in the fourth quarter.

"We did everything we weren't supposed to do in the second quarter," said de Marigny of the second period where WWS outscored the Warriors 23-16. "Then we got in some foul trouble - Rachel Kent, who is a definite leader on our team, picked up her third. So we needed some others to step up and they did."