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Naperville North wraps up busy week with win vs. Lake Park

Naperville North had a very good week. It got even better Saturday.

The Huskies concluded their busy week with their third straight DuPage Valley Conference girls basketball win since Tuesday, defeating visiting Lake Park 52-48 on Saturday. The week began with Monday's confidence-building near-upset of No. 1-ranked Montini at Coach Kipp's Hoopfest in Villa Park.

"It's been huge," Huskies senior guard Lauren Platou said of the week. "We've faced a lot of hard teams. And to see, I think, the growth from playing those teams in the start of the season maybe ending in a loss vs. playing them kind of farther in the season, pulling out those wins, has been huge for us. I think our team has gained a lot of confidence from those, too, so it's been great."

The Lake Park game was a typical back-and-forth matchup between the two teams. There were six ties and nine lead changes, and the Huskies (10-9, 6-4) didn't take the lead for good until freshman Greta Kampschroeder hit a 3-pointer with 44 seconds to go off a Platou assist for a 48-45 advantage.

"Obviously to have a freshman like that to connect with is a lot of fun," said Platou, who contributed 12 points. "And when you need points like that, to have her sink that, it was a great feeling just knowing that I can have confidence in a player like that, and just watching her make that shot was great."

The Huskies did the rest at the free-throw line, building the lead so Lake Park senior Carson Vance's 3-pointer with 2.1 seconds to play wasn't enough.

"I told the girls at halftime, the team that executes one more play might win this game," added Lake Park coach Brian Rupp, whose team is 14-7, 5-5 in the DVC. "I think that's what it came down to. Greta hitting that 3 really took hold of it."

Part of the difference for the Huskies lately has been that the Huskies are just figuring out how to play with Kampschroeder.

"The chemistry for the first half of the season I knew would take time to develop," Huskies coach Jason Dycus said. "When you're playing a freshman and two sophomores, that's going to take time. Well, after Christmas we have really stayed the course and we're jelling now. Our defense is really, really spurring on victories for us."

Kampschroeder led all scorers with 22 points. She also contributed 8 steals, 8 rebounds and 2 assists. Meanwhile, Lake Park sophomore Darrione Rogers put on a similar show for her team, finishing with 20 points, 6 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 steals.

"It was hard," Platou said. "It was a close game the whole way through. We had to execute, we had to play hard (defense). We knew that they had good players, good shooters all around. We just had to match their level of competition the whole way through."

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