St. Francis tips Lake Park
St. Francis sought a fresh start as the calendar flipped to the new year.
The Spartans found it Tuesday.
Rallying from 6 points down in the fourth quarter, St. Francis beat Lake Park 38-35 in Roselle to snap a five-game losing streak.
“I give my girls credit — they gutted it out,” St. Francis coach Jeff Gerdeman said. “For morale purposes we needed this one.”
St. Francis (9-8) endured a rough 0-5 go at the Suburban Holiday Showcase last week, dropping games to suburban powers Trinity, Niles West and Loyola.
No doubt the win felt good, even though the rust from a five-day layoff showed.
“We're 3A, so we need to be facing tough competition like that,” Gerdeman said. “It didn't work out quite like the way we wanted, but hopefully that pays off in the long run. Our girls are tough mentally, which is part of the reason why we pulled through tonight.”
Spartans center Fiona McMahon had 18 points and 14 rebounds, scoring 8 in the fourth quarter. Two McMahon free throws with 4:35 left tied it at 32-32. Kelly Reinke scored off a Lake Park turnover to make it 34-32, St. Francis' first lead since the second quarter.
“Our high-low opened things up a little bit for me. They were doubling down either way,” McMahon said. “When I moved up to the top me and Morgan (Connelly) were exchanging. It opened things up a little.”
An Alexis Hahn coast-to-coast basket snapped a four-minute dryspell for Lake Park to tie it, but Connelly rebounded a missed 3-point shot and stuck back a score to give St. Francis the lead for good, 36-34 with 2:01 left.
Trailing 36-35, Lake Park had a possession for the win in the final seconds, but was called for carrying before getting a shot off. St. Francis then found a wide-open McMahon on the inbounds from halfcourt for a three-point game.
Lake Park threw the ball away on its last-gasp chance for a tie, the Lancers' seventh turnover of the fourth quarter. St. Francis turned up its pressure down the stretch, and it clearly affected the Lancers.
“We got back on our heels,” Lake Park coach Chris Fruehling said, “and we started second-guessing ourselves a little bit. We tried to force some issues when we didn't have a clear look at a shot.”
Hahn scored 23 points and pulled down 7 rebounds for Lake Park (8-6), the seventh time the Lancers junior has gone over 20 points this season.
A Hahn score with 6:18 left in the game gave Lake Park its biggest lead at 32-26. The Lancers, who saw their four-game winning streak end, continue a rugged week Thursday at Waubonsie Valley, then go to Neuqua Valley on Saturday.
“Defensively, our kids played very hard — I was very proud with how hard they worked,” Fruehling said. “It's unfortunate that you don't always come away with a win, but we'll keep working and try to take something from this game to help us out for the next game.”
Reinke scored 10 points for St. Francis.