Benet gets the message, beats St. Viator

When Benet is good, the Redwings are very, very good.

At halftime Tuesday against St. Viator, they found out their first half was not one of those times.

"I just think the kids came in a little less than fully engaged in the first half," Benet coach Joe Kilbride said. "We had some pointed conversation at halftime, and I think they locked in for a little bit."

"He said, Stop turning the ball over," Benet senior Ashley Konkle added. "You've got to rebound. Right now we've got two people going in on offensive rebounds and it can't be like that. His exact words were, 'Take an extra 5-foot step and get the ball.'"

The Redwings responded to Kilbride's halftime pep talk by showing St. Viator just how good they are, taking a 54-29 East Suburban Catholic Conference girls basketball victory in Lisle.

After a first half that featured 4 lead changes and 2 ties, Benet (14-2, 3-0) led 22-20. Neither side was thrilled with the quality of play.

"I thought we were scrappy on defense," St. Viator coach Jason Raymond said. "I thought we executed well at times, but we had a couple too many turnovers there that led to some easy baskets for them. We didn't rotate back on defense a couple of times, so we probably could have played a little bit better defensively."

Switching to a 2-3 matchup zone defense from a man-to-man, Benet scored the first 14 points of the third quarter, making 6 of its first 7 shots.

"Honestly, it stemmed up of Coach came in and just was straight up with us at halftime," Benet senior Ashley Konkle said. "He got into us. We needed it. We have a tendency to come out first half and act like, the team that we're playing, we're much better than them. Every team's out to get us right now in the state."

Elise Horbach's basket with 2:28 to go in the third period ended the Lions' scoring drought, but it didn't stop the Redwings. They kept building their lead right up to the end of the game, holding St. Viator to 9 second-half points.

"In that second half we just had no answer for their inside game and Benet kind of woke up a little bit on us, if you will," Raymond said.

Freshman Joy Bergstrom led St. Viator (10-4, 1-2) with 12 points.

"She was killing us," Konkle said. "She was killing us first half. She's good. And she was killing us and so we kind of got out on her and got out on everyone else."

Junior Brooke Schramek led Benet with 12 points. Konkle and Lauren Stack added 10 points apiece.