Brooke Spychalski, Yorkville not fazed by Naperville Central star’s return, win regional rematch

AURORA – Yorkville senior Brooke Spychalski was as curious as anyone in the gym Tuesday at the sight of Trinity Jones warming up.

Four weeks after Spychalski and the Foxes beat Naperville Central, they received a curveball for the regional rematch.

That was Jones, a 6-foot-2 junior and high Division I prospect who had missed the entire regular season with a torn ACL.

But there she was, in uniform and putting up shots.

“We were all like, ‘What is going on?’ ” Spychalski said. “We were nervous, but we knew we had to make something happen.”

Indeed, Jones' season debut didn’t prevent the Foxes from taking care of business.

Spychalski scored a game-high 20 points with eight rebounds, and sixth-seeded Yorkville used a big run at the end of the first half to take control of an eventual 61-42 win over 11th-seeded Naperville Central in the Class 4A Metea Valley Regional semifinal.

Lainey Gussman added 13 points and eight rebounds and Sydney McCabe 11 points for Yorkville (19-10), which advanced to its third straight regional final and a third meeting this season with Bolingbrook on Friday.

Erin Hackett, the third player in Naperville Central program history to score 1,000 points before her senior year, led the Redhawks (13-19) with 15 points.

“Everytime you play a team, it’s not going to be the same,” Spychalski said. “We didn’t know Trinity was going to play, but we had to make adjustments. We ended up getting the win.”

Jones, who has been practicing with Naperville Central for a week and a half, didn’t start, checking in three minutes into Tuesday’s game. She immediately flashed her tremendous athletic ability, going over a Yorkville player to rebound a missed free throw and sticking in a score.

Jones, though, only played in spurts, scoring six points and grabbing a handful of rebounds.

“She’s in November, and everybody else is in February,” Naperville Central coach Andy Nussbaum said. “You can see the kind of athlete she is. Her minutes were limited.”

As was Yorkville’s scouting report on Jones, although Foxes' coach Kim Wensits had texted Nussbaum about her status.

“He said as far as he knew, no, she wasn’t playing. I played against Andy and coached against him, he wasn’t trying to sandbag me. You see her in warmups and thought, ‘Maybe,’ ” Wensits said. “Incredibly proud of the kids. We didn’t have anything on [Jones] except she’s an incredible athlete.

“We said we wanted to start strong and finish strong on the defensive end, and in the middle we wanted to pull away. I thought we did that.”

Yorkville hit 14 3-pointers in the teams' first meeting, a 67-53 win at Batavia’s MLK Showdown.

Defense, though, was what set the tone in the rematch.

“Every single practice we said we had to be aggressive, because they couldn’t handle our pressure. Defense wins games,” Spychalski said. “Our goal was to get eight defensive stops in a row. It ended up winning us the game.”

Tessa Williams' 3-pointer had Naperville Central ahead 18-17 with three minutes left in the first half, but the Redhawks didn’t score again in the half.

McCabe answered with a 3-pointer to give Yorkville the lead for good, and Madi Spychalski threw up a 3 as time expired in the half to cap a 12-0 run for a 29-18 halftime lead.

“Even when we were up, we had missed shots we should have made,” Nussbaum said. “Kim’s teams are not going to beat themselves, and play good defense. We don’t do well with physical play.”

McCabe did Naperville Central in again with a late flurry to end the third quarter, scoring eight straight points with two 3s for a 41-30 lead. An 8-0 Yorkville run to open the fourth broke the game open.

“We needed that offense from Sydney. Madi has the flu, so we needed someone to step up,” Spychalski said. “McCabe hitting those shots was a game-changer.”

Yorkville, seeking its first regional title since 2019, will look to change its fortunes against Bolingbrook. The Raiders beat the Foxes 55-47 and 51-37 in conference play.

“It’s hard to beat a good team three times,” Wensits said, echoing Spychalski, “but at the same time Bolingbrook is very physical and good. We have to take better care of the basketball.

“We’ve given up 17 and 21 points off turnovers to them in our two games. We as coaches have to get creative to take pressure off our point guard.”