Kaneland holds off St. Edward
When Kaneland's girls basketball team needed a big shot Monday, the Knights turned to their only senior starter and she came through like, well, like a senior.
Ally VanBogaert scored 11 of her 13 points in the second half, including hitting two big 3-pointers in the fourth quarter, as Kaneland held off St. Edward 39-37 in the first round of the Class 3A Sycamore regional.
"I was like, I need to make them. We're winning this game," said VanBogaert. "We're not going to end our season here."
The fourth-seeded Knights (17-9) didn't, although they had to hold off a furious rally by No. 5 St. Edward in order to advance to Wednesday's 6 p.m. semifinal against No. 1 seed Burlington Central (24-3), the No. 2 ranked team in the state.
Kaneland looked well on its way to an easy win Monday night as the Knights rolled out to a 16-4 lead with an 11-0 run to end the first quarter. Sophomore Morgan Weber, who did a stellar job of hounding St. Edward senior 3-point threat Ryann Scully all night, scored 8 of her 11 points in the first half as the Knights maintained a 12-point advantage at halftime, 22-10. St. Edward (18-10) struggled to find the bottom of the net in the first half, making just 3 of 21 field goal attempts (14 percent) and Kaneland owned a 30-10 rebounding advantage, 10 of them off the offensive glass.
But the Green Wave came out of the halftime locker room a different team, going on a 10-3 run to pull within 25-23 after a Katie Castoro basket with 2:24 left in the third quarter.
"They're a good team and we knew they'd battle back in the second half," said Kaneland coach Ernie Colombe of the Green Wave.
After Colombe called a time out, VanBogaert scored the last 5 points of the third quarter, hitting a 12-footer on the baseline at the 2:04 mark and then a 3-pointer from the right wing with 1:04 left to send Kaneland into the fourth quarter ahead 30-23.
But again St. Edward fought back, cutting the lead to 3 three different times before Scully hit her only 3-pointer of the night, from WNBA range, to tie the game at 35-35 with 3:40 to play.
Junior Camri Conley split a pair of free throws with 2:07 to go to give the Knights a 36-35 lead and after St. Edward missed a 3-pointer, VanBogaert took a feed from Conley and buried a 3 from deep in the left corner to put Kaneland up 39-35 with 1:22 to play.
"Ally hit some really big shots tonight," said Colombe. "That's a senior stepping up at the right moment."
Two Castoro free throws with 44 seconds to go brought the Green Wave to within 2, 39-37, and St. Edward still had a chance after Kaneland missed the front end of two straight one-and-ones. But the Wave turned the ball over with eight seconds left and even though the Knights missed yet another front end of a bonus with 5.5 seconds left, St. Edward couldn't get a shot off before the final horn and the Knights survived.
Senior Cece Rapp had 13 points, 14 rebounds and 6 blocked shots for St. Edward but the 6-foot-3 Lindenwood recruit was bottled up inside all night by a collapsing Kaneland defense.
"Nothing was going our way," said Rapp, who did find consolation in her team's fight back into the game. "We just said we needed to get together and it was 0-0," she said of the Wave's halftime mentality. "I'm so proud of my team for not staying down and coming back and fighting till the end."
Junior Bailey Crimmins added 7 points and 6 rebounds for the Knights, while Conley and junior Vanessa Gould each had 7 rebounds.
"I was really happy with our defense all night," Colombe said. "To hold them in the 30s was a really good effort. We didn't want Rapp to beat us. We had to contain her. She had 13 points but she had to work for them. And we had really good defense from Morgan Weber tonight. She was in lockdown mode on 32 (Scully)."
Castoro, a sophomore, added 10 points for St. Edward, all in the second half as she sat out much of the first half in foul trouble. Scully had 8 rebounds.
"We struggled putting the ball in the basket and rebounding," said St. Edward coach Michelle Dawson. "We did a lot of the things we wanted to do in this game but our scoring struggles in the first half made things more challenging. But we bounced back and fought. This loss wasn't due to lack of preparation or effort. They never quit and they never stopped fighting. Our seniors led this team all year and I told them in the locker room there was never a game this year where I didn't feel we had the full effort."
Now Kaneland gets a shot at Burlington Central. The two did not meet in the regular season for the first time in several years.
"We're ready to play them," VanBogaert said.