Byron girls basketball uses youth leadership to charge toward another strong finish
The youngest basketball squad to take the floor for Byron in this era has still found a way to build enough momentum headed down the backstretch that the target on their back has not only returned, but it's just about as big as it's ever been.
"Byron is just good; all-over-the-place good," Lutheran's star sophomore guard Soraya Parker said after the Tigers held off the Crusaders 60-52 last Saturday. "We just really wanted to beat them."
That was the last time Byron has played, after recent postponements and cancellations due to the weather. And that was right after the Tigers had taken Boylan, one of the top Class 3A teams around, to double-overtime before falling 55-51.
Byron basketball: Byron holds off Lutheran, now can lock down Big Northern Conference title next game
“This was a lot of fun,” Boylan coach Westlund said as his team bolted out of the gym with the tight win over Byron.
Byron, which won back-to-back 2A state titles in 2016 and 2017 and then took second at state last year, is going with its youngest lineup in Eric Yerly's 20-year head coaching career. It could be the youngest in Byron girls basketball history, Yerly agreed.
"It definitely could be. This group is that young," said Yerly, who has earned three of the program's four top four finishes at state. They also finished third in 1996 under John Nolan. "Last year it was a group that had been with me a long time, and had been together a long time, and I knew what they could do. This year, it took me a while. It took all of us a while."
Building speed
Byron dropped two of its first five games of the season, and three of its first eight. Yerly made a few adjustments, including moving forward Malia Morton, one of the two strong sophomores who were key freshmen on the court for last year's run, down into the post much more. She's just 5-foot-8 but plays taller, and plays aggressively, which has lit a fire.
"We've had to tweak some things, and that was one of the areas we really went after," Yerly said of the Morton move. "She's been great. She pops out, she goes down inside, whatever we ask... And that's opened a lot of things up for us."
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Groharing is having a strong season, topping her numbers across the board from last season when she averaged 14.2 points, 2.5 assists and 2.3 steals. The same goes for Morton, who averaged just under five points per game as a freshman and is averaging just under 10 as a sophomore.
Karsyn Bielskis has become even more of a leader on the floor this year as a junior and is making an even bigger impact night in and night out. Groharing, Morton and Bielskis combined to score 60 of Byron’s 101 points in its two games at state last year as the Tigers soared to a Class 2A state runner-up finish.
Time to see if it pays off
"It's all about working together, and we're finding that," Groharing said. "And really, once we found out what we were capable of doing, and what our defensive intensity could be, we've really turned it up."
Add in freshman Aubrie Fuller, a 5-7 guard who has been a key defender and can score when needed, and 5-5 sophomore shooting guards Layni Marchini and Brynn Green, and this team has transformed. And it's come together by following the lead of a freshman, four sophomores and a junior.
There isn't a single senior on the roster. But Byron (15-6, 6-0 BNC) is making another run at the Big Northern Conference title and is poised for another impressive postseason surge.
Byron had 31 steals in its eight-point win over Lutheran last week, and the Tigers have won five of six since the new year, with its only loss coming to Class 3A eighth-ranked Boylan. Byron is unranked but undeterred.
"This team is just getting comfortable out there. They're just getting there," Yerly said. "Now we'll see what it gets us."
After the game was postponed this week due to bad winter weather, Byron will now host Dixon (17-5, 4-1) next Monday. That game will still most likely decide the BNC crown, provided Byron takes care of business against Rockford Christian (5-14, 3-3) on Friday. The Tigers have already knocked off the other BNC power this season, Stillman Valley (22-4, 6-1), which is at Lutheran (16-6, 3-2) on Tuesday as the regular season winds down.
The BNC teams will begin postseason play on Feb. 12. The postseason seeds will be set and the brackets will be laid out on Feb. 2.
Jay Taft is a Rockford Register Star sports reporter. Email him at jtaft@rrstar.com and follow him on Twitter at @JayTaft. Sign up for the Rockford High School newsletter at rrstar.com. Jay has covered a wide variety of sports, from the Chicago Bears to youth sports, since the turn of the century at the Register Star, and for over 30 years all together.
This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Here's how Byron's young girls basketball team is staying hot in 2024
