La Salle-Peru wins big over Streator on senior night

LA SALLE – The La Salle-Peru girls basketball team’s four seniors made the most of their senior night celebration Tuesday.

Nathali Aguirre, Elli Sines, Phoebe Shetterly and Madilyn Knowles started and played significant minutes to lead the Cavaliers to a 46-19 win over Streator in a nonconference game.

“It was great,” L-P coach Adam Spencer said. “They’ve been a really good group. They’re the first ones on the court in the afternoon. They’re not dilly dallying around. We’re not begging them to come into the gym. They’ve been good.”

Sines and Shetterly are regular starters and were in the lineup Tuesday along with Aguirre, Knowles and junior Kelsey Frederick.

The starters got the Cavs off to a strong start as Frederick scored L-P’s first three baskets, Knowles converted a layup and Shetterly hit a free throw for a 9-2 lead.

While Frederick was scoring in the paint in the first quarter, classmate Brie Ruppert got going down low in the second quarter.

Ruppert scored with 40.6 seconds left in the first and scored the first five points of the second quarter.

“We ran stuff through the corner,” Spencer said. “We were trying to set a lot of cross screens from the corner. Then you just have to finish one-on-one moves.”

Sines scored a pair of layups – one on a long pass from Alexus Hines and another after pushing upcourt off a rebound – and Hines scored a bucket as L-P’s lead ballooned to 24-6.

Along with the offense, the Cavs built their big lead by shutting down Streator’s offense.

Early on, Sines was switched to guarding Streator junior Ava Gwaltney, who leads the Bulldogs in scoring at 13.4 points per game, and was tasked with denying her the ball.

“I just stayed on her and tried to get her away from the ball as much as possible,” Sines said. “If she did get it, I just tried to calm myself and make sure she didn’t score.”

Gwaltney hit a 3-pointer in transition with 3:18 left in the first quarter before Sines started defending her, and from there was held to just three free throws – a pair in the second quarter and one in the final seconds of the game.

“Offensively, we try to get the ball into a lot of shooters’ hands,” Streator coach Jacob Durdan said. “I want to see a lot of people try to score the basketball. They did a good job tonight stopping Ava, who usually spearheads that attack. Across the board, they slowed us down on offense.”

L-P led 26-10 at halftime before starting to pull away in the third quarter as the Cavs got their perimeter offense going.

After shooting 0 of 14 from 3-point range in the first half, the Cavs drained three long-range shots in the third quarter – one by Shetterly and back-to-back makes by Sines – to extend their lead to 42-14.

“I think we just needed to see one go in, and then it just kind of flowed after that,” Sines said.

Ruppert led the Cavs (10-12) with 14 points, while Sines and Frederick scored 10 points each and Shetterly added six.

“I thought we moved the ball pretty well,” Spencer said.

Leah Krohe led the Bulldogs (1-23) with nine points, while Gwaltney had six.

“We had a tough game [Monday] night, so I think we had some tired legs coming in,” Durdan said. “We could have played a little bit more physical on the boards. We knew L-P is tough. They have some tall girls and some shooters. Last year, I think we would have struggled more. Conference-wise, we’re competing. Nonconference games, we’re working on it. We’re getting there.”

L-P plays Dixon on Thursday at home in a nonconference game, while Streator travels to Peotone on Thursday in an Illinois Central Eight contest.