Naperville Central beats Metea Valley at the arc

The season-ending knee injury All-Area forward Lucy Schmid suffered earlier this season not only robbed Naperville Central of its only true post player, it removed the only senior from the Redhawks' rotation.

Naperville Central compensated Tuesday night with strong 3-point shooting on offense and a suffocating zone defense to defeat Metea Valley 45-36 in a DuPage Valley Conference girls basketball game.

"We're obviously challenged vertically," Redhawks coach Andy Nussbaum said. "So we have to be able to shoot, and that's what we said at halftime. As long as we shoot well I think we're OK. They're pretty good-sized, but I thought we did enough defensively to keep them from really dominating."

Redhawks sophomore Carly Maida set the tone by starting the game with a pair of 3-point baskets. She hit three in the first quarter, four for the game and led all scorers with 14 points.

Naperville Central (8-15, 1-1) made 11 of its 30 3-point shots, with sophomore Gabi Melby hitting 3, junior Emily Spisak 2 and junior Kate Gilfillan and freshman Aditi Prasad 1 apiece.

"They all pretty much have green lights to shoot because we're not going to win games by pounding it inside," Nussbaum said.

The Redhawks made just four 2-point field goals.

Senior post player Tess Thompson led Metea Valley with 13 points, 9 rebounds and 3 steals despite that tough Naperville Central zone.

"I think we can play better than this, but Metea is getting better too," Nussbaum said.

The Mustangs (8-9, 1-1) made just 2 of 15 from behind the 3-point arc. Rachael Kern and Paige Buranosky each made a 3.

"We played well," Mustangs coach Cedric Williams said. "I thought we played well. I thought we competed. I thought they just made some shots. They executed."