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Another victory adds to Naperville Central's fun

Mia Lakstigala and her Naperville Central teammates are just having fun.

A lot of fun. Winning will do that for you.

The Redhawks won their 20th game of the season and remained undefeated in the DuPage Valley Conference with Tuesday night's 67-45 victory at Neuqua Valley.

"Yeah, it was a really fun game," Lakstigala said with a big smile.

As usual, Lakstigala played a major role in the win with 27 points, 20 of them in the first half. She had a hand in another 13 points with her 6 assists, while also grabbing 4 rebounds, 2 steals and blocking 2 shots.

"I also like being a point guard, you have to do more than scoring but also get other players involved," Lakstigala said. "I think when everybody is scoring it's just a more fun game in general. But also my teammates were running and I'd just want to get them the ball and they'd score."

Lakstigala recalled the teams' first meeting, when the Wildcats forced the Redhawks to overtime before falling.

"When we first played them it was a really tight game," Lakstigala said. "They played box-and-one so I knew they would do that again today. I think my teammates did a good job looking for me and I nailed my shots. But then I think also I looked for my teammates too, so everybody was just making shots, which really helped us."

The Redhawks led 35-25 at halftime, but the Wildcats (8-11, 3-6) crept closer midway through the third quarter.

"I think they're a good team. They played pretty well against us and I thought we responded to the challenge," Nussbaum said.

The Redhawks (20-4, 10-0) responded in the fourth quarter, outscoring Neuqua Valley 13-2 over the first 5:33 of the period to blow open the game and send the Naperville Central starters to the bench for good.

"It comes down to us and some of the things that we're doing," Neuqua Valley coach Mike Williams said. "We get it down to a 6-point game and some stuff happens that it can't. When you're playing a team like this you can't have a turnover, you can't have a foul and get them on the line and get them the ball back and all of a sudden now it turns from a 6-point game to a 10-, 12-point game just like that. That just takes the air out of your sails."

Lucy Schmid added 11 points and 8 rebounds for Naperville Central, and Gaby Melby scored 10. Senior Jasmine Walker came off the Neuqua Valley bench to lead the Wildcats with 9 points, all on 3-pointers.

Neuqua Valley vs. Naperville Central, girls basketball

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