ROXANA – Things hadn't gotten off to the kind of start Civic Memorial would have liked in their IHSA Class 3A Roxana Regional semifinal game against Cahokia Tuesday night.
The Eagles had only gotten to a 4-3 lead on the Comanches at quarter time, but were starting to surge, CM increasing the lead to 10-4 early in the second quarter.
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Then came a pileup going for a loose ball on the Cahokia end of the floor. The Eagles' Anna Hall, instead of getting right up, stayed on the floor.
The freshman was attended to and was taken from the floor on a backboard and taken to St. Louis Children's Hospital as a precautionary measure, a brace around her neck.
The Eagles (28-2) played on and posted a 71-31 win over the Comanches to advance to Thursday's final against Mississippi Valley Conference rival Triad, with a trip to the Waterloo Sectional next week at stake.
“She was having issues with her neck,” said Eagle coach Jonathan Denney. “Basketball's secondary tonight; our thoughts and prayers are with Anna Hall. I want to make sure she's all right; she's a big part of our team, probably our best defensive player up post and has had a really good season as a freshman. It's precautionary and she'll be able to get back with us down the road.”
“In all my years of playing basketball, I've never had anything like that happen,” said CM's Allie Troeckler. “Obviously, all of us are really concerned for her, but we had to go out and play the game and play harder for her.”
“We're hoping she's OK and she's ready to bounce back,” added Kaylee Eaton. “We're happy someone stepped up; Hannah Schmidt stepped up and helped out the team a lot.”
Denney told his players that there was a time during the postseason that they were likely to be facing some adversity. “I told the girls after we got her out of the gym, 'I told you there was going to be a time when we were going to be faced with some adversity',” Denney said. “And we got it the first game right here.”
CM's slow start wasn't what Denney would have liked. “We didn't really come out ready to play,” Denney said. “I thought we were kind of sluggish and careless with the basketball, and unfortunately, it was Allie Troeckler that kind of set that tone early with a couple of nonchalant passes.”
That prompted Denney to pull Troeckler early; she didn't return until the second quarter. “I was hoping to get her mad a little bit,” Denney admitted. “I think she played pretty darn good after that.”
The lengthy delay may helped the Eagles regain some focus. “That's where it starts is focus,” Denney said. “We though we were pretty prepared coming in and it looked like our focus wasn't there in the first quarter, at least that's what it looked like to me.
“For whatever reason, we didn't have focus at the beginning of the game and that's a little bit disappointing, but maybe that's a good wake-up call for them, not having Anna and having to go next man up for her.”
Once the Eagles got rolling, they were hard to stop, going to a 31-15 lead at the half and 55-21 at three-quarter time. Troeckler led the Eagles with 30 points and 11 rebounds, with Eaton tacking on 12 points and six rebounds; Tori Pfeifer had eight points and Alaria Tyus seven for CM. Cahokia was led by Whitney Gines' 12 points, followed by Destiny Robinson's four points.
Thursday's championship game gets under way at 7 p.m.
