Benet's fast start results in Geneva's first loss
Benet's typical start meant an atypical result for Geneva on Saturday afternoon at the Montini Christmas Tournament quarterfinals in Lombard.
The Redwings jumped out to a quick 10-point lead, led by 14 after one quarter and never let its lead dip under 12 points again, grabbing a 69-52 victory over the Vikings in a matchup of unbeaten girls basketball teams.
"We started off too slow against a team like this," Geneva coach Sarah Meadows said. "I'm kind of mad at myself. We talked about it in the locker room, we just had to be more focused to start that game. It was a huge game for us. We knew that going in. We just had to have a better start."
"We wanted to play at tempo again with them, try and make them get up and down," Redwings coach Joe Kilbride added. "We've been doing a pretty good job all year, actually, of getting out early and jumping on people and playing with pace."
Geneva (11-1) started in a 3-2 zone defensively, and Benet (15-0) shot the Vikings out of that zone and into a man-to-man defense quickly, sprinting to an 11-1 lead and making its first five shots. The Redwings led the Vikings 29-15 by the end of the period.
Geneva tried to claw its way back into the game, but every time the Vikings could put together a couple of consecutive baskets, Benet answered with a brief run of its own. With two minutes left in the second quarter, an Emily Eshoo layup off an Elise Stout assist gave the Redwings a 21-point lead.
Benet's Big Three had a lot do with the victory as usual. Eshoo led all scorers with 24 points, Kathleen Doyle added 17 and Emily Schramek scored 14, all in the first half. But Stout, an unsung junior guard, also was a big reason for Benet's big win. Stout finished with 9 points, 8 steals, 6 assists, 4 rebounds and a block.
"We knew that we'd have to keep up with pressure to an extreme and keep getting those loose balls and keep diving on the floor to make every play we can," Stout said.
"Stout, she just is a high-effort, high-energy kid," Kilbride added, "and her and (Emma) Hlavin in particular have settled into roles where, 'If I score great, if I don't, great, let's go work our butts off and win.' You really need people to buy into that, and those two are leading the charge."
Senior Abby Novak led Geneva with 21 points, 11 rebounds and 3 blocked shots.
"Abby has played two games back-to-back that were lights-out," Meadows said. "I'm super-proud of her. She's capable of that, honestly, every single game. She's playing huge for us. That's what we need."
Geneva played without 6-foot-2 sophomore post player Grace Loberg, who is missing the tournament for an Olympic volleyball training camp, but Meadows refused to use Loberg's absence as an excuse.
"That's a good team," Kilbride said. "Obviously, with Grace there they're more formidable, right? But even without her, that's a good team. You could see in the third quarter it became a slower game. They were able to sort of use their bigs. We fouled too much and made it a half-court game. And even though we had a pretty good lead, I didn't really feel comfortable. Even with a 17-point lead with a couple of minutes to go, it just didn't feel like that much of a margin."
The tournament gets even tougher for Benet at 6:30 p.m. Monday when it meets tournament host and defending Class 3A champion Montini (16-1) in the first semifinal. Geneva plays Huntley (8-4) at 3 p.m. Monday.
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