Glenbard North slows down West Chicago

Glenbard North might not be the deepest girls basketball team around, but when the Panthers stick to their game plan they are hard to beat.

The Panthers beat former DuPage Valley Conference foe West Chicago 41-28 in West Chicago on Thursday by slowing the ball down offensively and executing when called upon.

"Slowing down at least gets their brain more functional, but the difficulty for us is slowing down might turn that offense into complete stagnation," said Glenbard North coach John Chamberlain. "So there's a plus and minus to it. I just maybe felt like we weren't getting as many positives out of pushing as negatives."

The Wildcats held their own in the first quarter and looked like they were going into the second tied until a Lisa Lubben 3-pointer gave Glenbard North an 11-8 lead.

The Panthers made their mark in the second by going on a 14-0 run. They had four of the six players in their main rotation score during the run, including Zakiya Newsome, who had a team-high 11 points with two 3-pointers.

"We only have six people," said Jennifer Deegan, who had 10 points on the night. "We normally don't go deeper than that and so we need everyone to score so it's not just one person scoring because one person can't win a game, obviously."

Glenbard North ended its 20-point second quarter leading 28-14.

"We're a young team and tonight we didn't quite understand the intensity level that we needed to come out on defense…," said West Chicago coach Kim Wallner. "There was not a lot of help-side defense. So we're working on a lot of concepts with defense and trying to put pressure on teams."

After being held to just 2 points in the third quarter, the Wildcats had a nice end to the game, putting up 9 points to Glenbard North's 2 points.

Offensively, West Chicago relied on junior Bria Williams, who had a game-high 14 points.

"She's got some outstanding athletic ability and can really do some nice things, and yet she's still working on a lot of aspects of the game besides offense," Wallner said.

A six-girl rotation might have worked against West Chicago, but Chamberlain will need players to step up their game in order to be successful.

"There's a lot of them making quantum leaps right now from where they were last year," Chamberlain said. "We've gotta let that sort itself out… . We're kind of trial by fire right now."