That’s one big win for Vernon Hills
A season of firsts continues.
“Now,” said Vernon Hills center Meri Bennett-Swanson, sitting in Elgin’s lower gym with a souvenir net at her side, “Coach Blanton has to get cornrows.”
In addition to assistant coach Rachael Blanton’s new ’do, throw in a possible buzz-cut, too, for head coach Paul Brettner.
The Cougars were stylin’ Monday night, using their bigs — the 6-foot-2 Swanson and 6-footer Lauren Webb — to win the biggest in their history, 53-46 over Belvidere North in the Class 3A Elgin supersectional. Webb scored a season-high 22 points and grabbed 11 rebounds, while Bennett-Swason added 14 points, 8 rebounds and 5 blocked shots.
“We’ve tried to accomplish things that no other Vernon Hills girls varsity basketball team has ever done,” senior guard Abby Springer said. “Going to state is definitely one of them. It was one of our goals from the very beginning.”
Vernon Hills (26-5) will play Springfield, a 77-50 winner over Salem in the Springfield (UIS) supersectional, in the state semifinals at noon Friday at Redbird Arena in Normal.
“I thought we played really well,” said Brettner, whose Cougars set the school record for wins nearly a month ago and never had won a regional before this season. “Belvidere North is a tough opponent, for sure, and they matched a lot of our runs. But we pulled away just enough, hit our free throws down the stretch and did things that we were looking to do.”
A 3-pointer by backup senior guard Erinn Blake in the closing seconds of the opening half had Belvidere North up 26-24. But Vernon Hills remained committed to pounding the ball inside and started wearing down the Blue Thunder in the third quarter, outscoring its opponent 15-6.
Sydney Smith (4 points, 6 rebounds, 3 steals) finished a pass from Bennett-Swanson to score inside and tie the score at 28-28 early in the third. When Bennett-Swanson banked in a 12-footer, off a dish from Springer, Vernon Hills had the lead for good at 30-28 with 5:58 to go.
The lead grew to as many as nine points in the fourth.
“We were trying to go inside,” Brettner said. “Lauren, ‘Mer’ and ‘Syd,’ all three of them were playing really tough inside, getting easy buckets, going to the line. That’s what we were looking for.”
Webb was dominant from the start. The sophomore hit at least one shot from the floor in every quarter. She also sank the Cougars’ only 3-pointer, bouncing in a shot from the top of the key to stretch the lead to 33-28 with 5:18 left in the third.
“Lauren had a great game, didn’t she?” Brettner said. “Very aggressive going to the basket. Really, really carried a lot of the load on offense. We like when she does that.”
“It was the team,” said Webb, refusing to take any credit. “Even though (Belvidere North) had some great defense, we kept playing our game when it came to offense, reversing the ball and not giving up.”
Belvidere North (23-10) played with heavy hearts. Two Belvidere North students, junior cheerleaders, died in a car accident Friday night. Blue Thunder players wore T-shirts during pregame warm-ups with “This game’s for you!” on the back. A moment of silence was held in Elgin’s main gym before tipoff.
“We had an opportunity to cancel practice on Saturday, and they didn’t want to,” Blue Thunder coach Michael Bradford said of his players. “They just wanted to go and do what they do, and that’s play basketball. I know the town is extremely proud of the effort they put out there tonight. They gave everything they had.”
Vernon Hills knew it had to be ready for whatever Belvidere North was going to bring, regardless if the Cougars were facing a fragile team considering the circumstances.
“We were prepared for either way,” said Cougars guard Julie Pecht, who went 3 of 5 from the foul line in the fourth. “They came out well. They were a really good team.”
Center Katie Dovenmuehle led Belvidere North with 14 points, including a 3, and 9 rebounds. Guard Autumn Neuhring added 12 points on four 3-pointers.
“It was a tough day at school,” an emotional Neuhring said. “Everybody was crying at school all day long. ... It’s just hard to clear that out of our mind. We tried. We wrote on our shoes. We put stuff on our shirts. We bought these shirts for them. Everything was for them.”