The Evanston girls basketball team built an early lead and withstood a late rally to earn a 56-45 win over Loyola in a Class 4A Niles West Sectional semifinal on Monday.
Leighah-Amori Wool paced the Wildkits (27-3) with 30 points, which tied a career high, and nine rebounds. Evanston built a 20-point lead in the second half and Loyola never got closer than nine points.
“I was really proud of our seniors,” Evanston coach Brittanny Johnson said of Wool, Allysah Boothe, Brianna Miller, Krystal Forrester and Leah Robinson. “This is their goal. They want to get downstate and this was how you have to play to get there.”
Top-seeded Evanston led 14-5 after a quarter and held a 34-14 lead early in the third before fourth-seeded Loyola began to scrap its way back into contention.
The Ramblers earned a 21-14 scoring edge in the fourth quarter, but every time they made a run the Wildkits had an answer.
First-half turnovers and cold shooting effectively doomed the Ramblers (21-11).
“You just can’t start off a game like that,” Loyola coach Jeremy Schoenecker said. “We were chasing them the whole game and it just wasn’t us tonight.”
Evanston plays third-seeded Maine West in a sectional title game at Niles West on Thursday. Maine West beat seventh-seeded Maine South 44-33 in the other semifinal on Monday.
Gary Larsen is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
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