St. Charles East victorious, W. Chicago drops to 0-6

Youth is being served this year at St. Charles East and West Chicago, where the schools' girls basketball teams are full of underclass and inexperienced bodies.

Both squads have had difficulty finding their way in the early days of the season, though based on Tuesday's nonconference performance, St. Charles East is on the way toward figuring some things out.

The Saints defeated the Wildcats 53-42 to improve to 2-4. West Chicago dropped to 0-6.

"The first quarter was a little shaky," St. Charles East coach Lori Drumtra said, "but I thought they did a really nice job tonight."

Both teams tried to do things defensively to shake up things. St. Charles East shifted from its man-to-man defense to a 1-3-1 zone in the second quarter and West Chicago struggled to come to terms with the setup.

"It's such a young team, we keep telling them that you have to take it quarter by quarter," Drumtra said. "You can't be thinking about the fourth quarter in the first quarter. You go and try to win that first quarter and then move on."

The Saints' biggest margin of victory in any quarter was 15-5 in the second quarter. In that period St. Charles East dealt effectively with West Chicago's full-court press.

"They did some nice things getting over the top," West Chicago coach Kim Wallner said. "We got caught a little too far up sometimes. But we also got some good things out of it, so it's a give and take."

St. Charles East junior Natasha Lalos got loose for 16 points.

"We had kind of a slow start, but it feels good to get another win under us," Lalos said. "We struggled a little in the first quarter, but afterward we started to work together."

Lalos scored steadily through the game, but she scored 7 of her team's 11 third-quarter points.

"My teammates were finding me really well down the floor on our breakaways," Lalos said. "I had some good passes too."

Given a chance to seal the game at the free-throw line, the Saints were deadly and converted 12 of 13.

"That's good to see because we haven't done that well in that area in the past," Drumtra said. "Those a.m. free throws are paying off, though they'll hate to hear that."

Jamie Rust added 11 points for the Saints.

Sophomores Jessica Baids had 9 points and Katie Staiton 8 points to lead West Chicago in scoring.

"This is such a young group," Wallner said. "You saw that out there when they switched to the 1-3-1. That kind of stymied us."

While the Saints performed well at the free-throw line, West Chicago struggled, hitting 4 of 14 free throws.

"No, we didn't lose it there, but we were 0 for 7 in the second half," Wallner said. "That could have maybe crept us closer."

The closest West Chicago got in the second half was a 5-point deficit with the ball early in the fourth quarter. The Wildcats turned over the ball and St. Charles East responded with a 6-point run.