Rolling Meadows holds off Buffalo Grove
Rolling Meadows girls basketball coach Ryan Kirkosky, now in his ninth year at the school, could have relied on the chorus of an old song Tuesday night.
"Accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, latch on to the affirmative."
Kirkorsky's squad needed to use all three of those attributes to hold off a pugnacious Buffalo Grove unit 49-43 Tuesday evening, sweeping the season series from the Bison as round two of Mid-Subruban divisional play began.
The Mustangs (6-2, 4-2 MSL East) won at Buffalo Grove in the season opener just 17 days ago 73-71.
"They're (Buffalo Grove) really a resilient team and every time you think you might be able to put them away, they keep coming back and they did that tonight," Kirkosky said.
The Bison (2-5, 2-4) rallied from deficits of 7 and 8 points twice each, forging a 39-all tie on freshman Hanna Glanz's layup with 4:55 to play before junior guard Moira Hickey's layup 68 seconds later put Meadows ahead to stay. The Mustangs would then outscore the visitors 8-4 the rest of the way with all 8 points coming at the charity stripe with junior guards Emily Galvan (game-high 23 points) and Alison Sellegren connecting on 4 free throws apiece.
Galvan credited BG's defense for creating a difficult challenge for her and her teammates.
"They came out in a triangle and they had two players guarding me and (fellow junior guard) Madi (Niedbala). They definitely made it hard for us to get open shots, but I think we did a really good job moving the ball fast and looking for the open shooters."
Five-foot-7 sophomore forward Kora Kipley paced Buffalo Grove with 13 points.
Bison coach Martha Kelly emphasized the importance of playing this season with nary a senior on its 10-player varsity roster.
"We needed to play this season so that we could learn. Learn from our mistakes. Learn how to play. Learn how to play together. I give them one goal and that is to just go out there, play hard and compete," Kelly said.
"I think if the girls learn to do just that we can accomplish some good things in the future."