Origel, Erickson lead Burlington Central's rout of McHenry
Sam Origel had to wait her turn on the bench with seniors and other shooters blocking her path the past two seasons, but now the Burlington Central senior has the green light to shoot early and often.
It's brought a solid scoring punch along with that inherent trust.
"She does [have the green light]," Rockets coach Collin Kalamatas said following the Rockets' 51-30 win over McHenry on Wednesday.
"She's been really good about understanding how to include her teammates with it, too, so when [defenses collapse], she's been kicking it out. [She] really has good court vision, and I think that's what makes her such a good scorer [because] she understands when to pick and choose her spots."
Origel scored eight of her 14 points in the first quarter and was one of the reasons why the Rockets (11-5, 4-2) built an insurmountable 30-7 halftime lead.
McHenry (3-14, 1-6), meanwhile, struggled to only two points in the second quarter and had 16 turnovers at the break.
"She's really kind of balanced out when to attack the rim and catch-and-shoot situations," Kalamatas said of Origel.
"I've been really confident with my shot lately," Origel said on her first half of the season. "I've been trying to work on it. We try to all give each other the confidence to shoot, whether we make it or miss it."
Getting her teammates involved is another focus. Origel had three assists on the night.
"I really like getting our teammates involved because I feel like that's the whole point of the game," Origel said. "I'm really into that."
"She's doing a really good job [getting to] the basket [and] creating shots for our team, which is helping out team overall," Rockets senior guard Page Erickson said of Origel. "Rebounding, too."
Erickson also stuffed the stat sheet with 18 points, eight rebounds and six assists to lead Central to a fourth consecutive win.
"[Erickson] was awesome out there, so [I'm] happy to see their development [coming along]," Kalamatas said.
Burlington Central also was led by Haley Lindquist's nine points, while Kenzie Andersen and Jordyn Charles each had four.
McHenry turned in a more spirited second half and was able to keep somewhat within striking distance when 3-point shots from Emerson Gasmann started to fall to close the third quarter. Gasmann hit consecutive 3s to end the third quarter down 45-17.
The Warriors also trimmed down their turnovers to five in the second half.
"[The] first half is usually tough. It's just offensively we just need to find a way to score, right?," McHenry coach John Lunkenheimer said. "We got some good looks, just got to finish, but I'm proud, fourth quarter especially, [we kept competing]. We're not very deep. We only have eight to nine girls that can play. We didn't stop playing. That's the message: You competed [and] we cleaned up some of the mistakes we worked on at halftime. That's all you can ask when you have a bad first half like that."
Gasmann finished with 13 points to pace the Warriors, while Peyton Stinger had eight points.
"[Gasmann is] our best athlete. She actually just committed to go play soccer at Loras College," Lunkenheimer said. "She just came back from a long break and we were kind of rusty there, which is fine. She's definitely our best athlete. She's playing well."