1A girls basketball: St. Bede can’t keep up with Okawville in second half in semifinal loss

NORMAL - During its historic postseason run, the St. Bede girls basketball team has rallied from double digits down to survive and advance.

But playing in their first state tournament, the Bruins stumbled in the third quarter, fell behind by 11 and couldn’t rally in a 44-30 loss to defending state champion Okawville in a Class 1A state semifinal Thursday at Illinois State University’s CEFCU Arena.

“We knew we were going up against the defending state champions and a player who has scored 2,000 points,” St. Bede coach Stephanie Mickley said. “We prepared as best we can. It was a two-point game at half. The girls played really tough. A big difference is they’ve been here before and this is our first time in school history. Some nerves played a factor. That’s understandable. They never stopped fighting.”

Both teams started slow as neither scored in the first 2:39 until Okawville’s Adysen Harre hit a free throw.

“It was a two-point game at half. The girls played really tough. A big difference is they’ve been here before and this is our first time in school history. Some nerves played a factor. That’s understandable. They never stopped fighting.”

—  Stephanie Mickley, St. Bede coach

St. Bede grabbed the rebound off Harre’s missed free throw and senior guard Ella Hermes passed up to sophomore guard Lily Bosnich who went in for a layup for the Bruins’ lone lead of the game at 2-1 with 5:15 left in the first quarter.

Okawville led 9-7 after the first quarter and held a 14-9 lead midway through the second quarter - the largest lead of the half - before St. Bede rallied.

Hermes drained a 3-pointer with 1:46 left in the half and on St. Bede’s next trip down the floor Ashlyn Ehm hit a pair of free throws after being fouled on her fourth shot of the possession to tie it at 16.

The Rockets led 20-18 at halftime.

“We practiced a man-to-man and a sagging defense to try to contain (three-time first-team AP/Illinois Media All-Stater Alayna) Kraus as best we can and the more I scouted them, we looked at some weaknesses,” Mickley said. “A 3-2, we haven’t shown it much this season, we switched to that and I think it did throw them off the first half.”

Okawville took control in the third quarter, forcing three straight turnovers and scoring five points in the first 1:36 to push the lead to seven at 25-18.

“We talk about the third quarter all year,” Okawville coach Haylee Bowers said. “We talk about how we need to come out of the locker room more fired up and ready to play. We felt we played as a team the greatest in the first half so we had to come out and turn it on a little better.

“We talked about spreading out our offense a little bit and pull them out. Their 1-3-1, they’re so long and athletic that we were struggling to get paint touches, so we were trying to get it spread out so we could put it in the middle a little more.”

The teams traded baskets before the Rockets went on an 8-0 run on a 3-pointer by freshman Kenley Hackstadt and five points from Kraus to go up 35-22 before St. Bede’s Savannah Bray scored on a putback with 10.2 seconds left to make it 35-24 going to the fourth.

“Kraus came alive a little bit more, I think fatigue was a little bit of a factor, we weren’t snagging the rebounds or securing them as best as we could have,” Mickley said. “Offensively, they had us scouted pretty well. It was kind of hard to fall into our offense. They double-teamed Ali (Bosnich). It was difficult to get into a flow.”

The Rockets played an intense full-court pressure defense that pestered the Bruins into 21 turnovers, which Okawville converted into 22 points.

“I feel at the top we were just trying to rush everything and they were getting into our heads, so by the third quarter we lost our confidence,” Hermes said.

St. Bede was hampered by foul trouble as Lili McClain had three fouls in the first half, while Ehm and Hermes had three fouls each less than 3 minutes into the third.

“Foul trouble did hurt,” Mickley said. “It was a physical game. If you get caught in the wrong place at the wrong time and your hands are there, it happens. It kind of went in spurts. We used our bench to try to stop the bleeding. Our bench did a nice job stepping up and chipping in, but it is a momentum shifter for sure.”

The Rockets pushed their lead to as many as 16 in the fourth quarter and the Bruins never managed to get closer than 12.

Ali Bosnich led St. Bede with 11 points, 13 rebounds and three steals, while Ehm had eight points, six rebounds and three steals, Bray scored six points, and Hermes finished with three points and four assists.

Kraus scored 25 points and grabbed 10 rebounds to lead the Rockets (24-11), who will face Illini Bluffs in the title game at 11 a.m. Saturday.