RAYMOND, Ill. – It has been some time since Calhoun or Carrollton has won a girls basketball sectional championship.
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The Warriors won three straight from 2015-2017 while the Hawks hadn’t won one since 2014.
Carrollton snapped that streak Thursday night as they took on their longtime rivals in an IHSA Class 1A sectional championship played at Lincolnwood High School in Raymond, Ill.
The Hawks got out to a slow start but a big run to end the first half saw them take control and go on to win by a score of 57-39.
“We had our goal. We had our mindset,” Carrollton head coach Brian Madson said. “It doesn’t matter how we got there, how many losses we get, especially in December. But come late February, we’re clicking on all cylinders. That’s what this team is. They’re going to fight all the way until the end.”
The Warriors opened the game on a 10-2 run with baskets from Anna Oswald and Audrey Gilman and back-to-back threes from Bralyn Lammy and Gilman. Two free throws from Gilman and another three from Lammy saw Calhoun go ahead 15-4, later leading 15-9 after the first quarter.
Calhoun kept at a good pace and remained ahead 23-14 before the game was flipped on its head.
The Hawks went on a 13-0 run to close the half. All 13 points came from Lauren Flowers.
The run started with a couple of free throws, a normal basket, and an and-one basket. Then, back-to-back threes gave the Hawks their first lead of 27-23 at halftime.
“We’ve been down a lot,” Madson said. “Sometimes that’s my fault for not calling timeouts when teams go on big runs. But when you have Lauren Flowers on your team, just hop on her back, she’s going to take us places. For her to get the team on her back, that’s the kind of player she is.”
“With her you’ve got to pick your poison,” Calhoun head coach Mark Hillen said. “Do you want to guard her at the three-point line? You know, you’ve got to double her in the post as much as you can afford to. Tonight she was just on fire.”
“We tried different defenses, didn’t matter,” Hillen continued. “She was getting her looks and cashing in.”
From that point on, the momentum had fully shifted toward Carrollton as it kept its lead at 41-33 after three quarters. The Hawks opened the fourth quarter on an 11-3 run thanks to a three from Harper Darr and eight more points from Flowers to make it 52-35 midway through the fourth.
“We’ve been in that situation before,” Madson said. “Again, going back to that Lauren Flowers thing. When you’ve got her on your team, she’s going to will the rest of the team to win. I knew our girls would respond in that situation.”
Flowers single handedly changed the direction of the game, and the Warriors never got back into it.
“They grabbed the momentum, and we couldn’t ever get it back in the second quarter, and then in the third quarter we got stops but didn’t score,” Hillen said “At that point, you’ve got to figure out a way to get on a run yourself and we just never did get it.”
Calhoun was led by Gillman with 12 points. Oswald had eight, Lammy had six, and Stella Gress had five. One of Calhoun’s leading scorers, Kate Zipprich, was held without a field goal and finished with two points on the night.
The Warriors’ season comes to a close with a 25-7 record.
The icing on the cake for Carrollton was being able to give its starting five a proper curtain call. Up by 16 points with a little over a minute left, Madson pulled his starters as a large crowd from both Carrollton and Calhoun gave them a standing ovation.
“It was more so because I didn’t want to risk injury,” Madson joked. “But definitely, they deserve it, especially the four seniors. They’ve been through a lot the last four years with coaching changes, things like that, so it’s a very special moment for them to exit with the lead that we had.”
“That was just amazing,” Flowers said. “You just sit on the bench and take everything in because this is a one-time deal.”
Flowers, who admitted she gets “a little nervous” before big games, ended the night with 32 points, Carrollton’s lone double-digit scorer. Hayden McMurtrie and Darr each had six, Blake Driskill had five, and Brooklyn Eilerman and Abby Flowers each had three.
Carrollton came into its sub-sectional as the No. 3 seed, while Calhoun was the No. 1 seed in the other sub-sectional. The Hawks “upset” top-seeded Okawville Tuesday night and have now taken down both No. 1 seeds. They’re now one win away from the state tournament.
“We like being the underdog, not going to lie,” Flowers said. “You have nothing to lose when you’re an underdog. We can do it; I have no doubt we can do it.”
Carrollton improves to 28-7 on the year and moves on to the Okawville Super-Sectional. It will take on Edwards County of Albion, Ill. on Monday, March 3 at 7 p.m. The Lions won the Campbell Hill (Trico) Sectional by defeating Marissa 40-37.
“I’ll do my homework tonight; we’ll figure out what we’re going to do,” Madson said. “We’ll have a gameplan going in.”
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