Huntley advances to FVC championship game
Since the start of team get-togethers and practices, Huntley's girls basketball team talked about playing for something special on the final day of the COVID-19-shortened season.
The Red Raiders will get that opportunity after beating last year's Fox Valley Conference champion, Dundee-Crown, 45-29, Wednesday in the FVC tournament semifinals.
Second-seeded Huntley (10-3) and top-seeded Burlington Central, which beat No. 5-seeded Prairie Ridge, 44-40, in Wednesday's other semifinal, will meet in the championship game at 7 p.m. Friday at Burlington.
Huntley's only conference loss this season was to the Rockets (12-2), who won the regular-season title with a 10-0 record. Burlington beat Huntley, 46-39, Feb. 12 in the teams' only meeting.
"It feels great. I feel like our team definitely deserves it," said sophomore forward Carley Faulkner, a two-year varsity player. "We put in a lot of time and effort into being the best we can. We are a better team today than [earlier in the season], for sure. We're going to go out and try our best. We're excited."
Sophomore guard Jessie Ozzauto had a team-high 14 points for the Raiders, while Faulkner (two blocks) and senior guard Raquel Radermacher tossed in 10 points apiece.
Faulkner scored eight of her 10 points in the fourth quarter as Huntley started to pull away, turning a 10-point lead after three quarters into as many as 17 in the fourth. The Raiders held the Chargers (5-6) to single digits in scoring in all four quarters, forcing 18 turnovers. Huntley, meanwhile, committed only 10 turnovers.
"All five spots played solid defense, and it was nice to see the kids really pull away at the end," Raiders coach Steve Raethz said. "We faced some adversity early, but I felt our kids really answered the bell. We had a lot of kids step up today."
One of those players was senior guard Sara Rysavy, who came off the bench and made a big 3-pointer with 15 seconds left in the first half. That gave Huntley its biggest lead at the time. Ozzauto then tacked on a last-second bucket for a 33-23 lead at halftime.
"It feels great. It's a real cool experience," Rysavy said of advancing to the tournament final. "This tournament is something none of us have done before, so it's cool to get there and get that opportunity.
"I think our team effort over the season really grew, and we learned to play together. It's unfortunate we don't get a real postseason. I think we can really do something special but we take what we get. Our goal was to be in this game, and we did it. '13 is 1,' we pull as a team. That's been our mindset all year."
D-C was led by senior forward Alyssa Crenshaw with a game-high 17 points on 5-of-7 shooting. Huntley double- and sometimes triple-teamed the 5-foot-10 Crenshaw (11 rebounds), but she still was able to find her way around the defense and to the hoop.
The Chargers held Huntley without a point in the game's first 4:36. The Raiders took their first lead on a Radermacher 3 with 2:55 left in the first quarter and never trailed again.
Kate Raby scored 4 points for the Chargers, and Gianine Boado and Marrasia Harthrone had 3 apiece. Kamsi Nwogu had 4 points and 6 rebounds for Huntley.
D-C (5-6) will get a chance to play one more time in the third-place game at 7 p.m. Friday at Prairie Ridge (5-6).
"Huntley's a tough team. They did a really good job of putting pressure on us," Chargers coach Sarah Teipel said. "I felt like we didn't maintain that toughness for four quarters. So credit to [Huntley]. I thought they screened us hard, they hit us hard on the drive, and we weren't were able to sustain that toughness."