Rosary comes back to down Harvest Christian

Rosary's bus broke down on the way to Elgin Tuesday night and then the Royals trailed host Harvest Christian by 18 points early in the third quarter.

But, spearheaded by a 22-0 run which covered parts of the third and fourth quarters, the Royals overcame all the adversity to post a 56-50 win over Harvest Christian in nonconference girls basketball action.

"I have never questioned the effort of this team," said Rosary coach Don Rasich. "They made every workout and game we had over the summer. We had a mental check at halftime and the girls came out and played a great second half."

The key to the win was the defensive effort on Lions' senior guard Paulina Castro, a Northern Illinois recruit.

Castro, who torched the Rosary (3-2) defense for 5 3-pointers and 17 points in the first half, managed only 2 free throws in the second half.

"I took it personally at halftime and I told the girls that Castro wasn't going to get 20," said Rasich. "We went from a straight man-to-man to a double team. We wanted to make sure she didn't get any open looks. It was a total team defensive effort."

After a 15-footer by Jenn Kasper, Harvest looked like it had a comfortable advantage with a 38-20 lead and 6:22 left in the third quarter.

Utilizing a blanket defense on Castro, the Rosary offense awoke and scored the final 17 points of the quarter.

Mary Kate Bakala scored 6 points, Taylor Drozdowski scored 4 and Caitlyn Unruh canned a crucial 3 as the Royals trailed 38-37 after 3 quarters.

Rosary scored the first 5 points of the fourth quarter led by buckets by Unruh and Aubrey Fisher and led 42-37 with 5:52 remaining.

The Lions broke a 9:01 scoring drought on a basket by Alyssa Iverson to make the score 42-39 with 5:21 left.

Harvest couldn't get any closer as Royals pulled out the win.

Drozdowski paced Rosary with 17 points, 15 in the second half.

"We just regrouped at halftime and kept our heads," said Drozdowski. "Our defense in the second half was tremendous."

Jenna Hernandez added 15 for the winners.

Castro scored 19 for the Lions and Rachel Oostdyk tallied 13.

"Rosary's pressure really got to us in the second half," said Harvest coach Rich DeTamble. "We will look at the tape and try to correct our mistakes."