With its first-ever state-ranking on the line, Pecatonica comes up big at the end
No. 6 Pecatonica cracked the state rankings for the first time in the school’s girls basketball history this week.
“We finally have something showing people it’s not just a boys sport around here. It’s also girls,” junior guard/forward Payton Thomas said, referring to Pec’s state-ranked boys team that has set a school record for wins two years in a row.
But you don’t celebrate being state-ranked for the first time in school history by going 0-for-the-week. But a weekly 0-fer is always a possibility in the NUIC North, the state’s toughest Class 1A girls basketball league. And Pecatonica lost to previously state-ranked Aquin before edging always-tough Lena-Winslow 41-35 at home Friday night.
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“It was a privilege to see we can finally get a state ranking,” said junior guard Elaina Rager, last year’s conference MVP who led Pec with 15 points Friday. “This bounce-back after Aquin, we really needed a team win.”
That win was in doubt most of the game. Lena-Winslow (14-6, 1-2 NUIC North) jumped to a 12-3 lead in the first quarter, led 20-16 at halftime and trailed only 37-35 until the final minute. The Panthers struggled on offense for much of the night — except when they got the ball to mobile 6-foot-1 senior center Grace Groezinger, who scored 13 of their first 18 points. Groezinger finished with 17, the only Le-Win player with more than six on the night.
“She’s a problem, man,” Pecatonica coach Daniel Rosenstiel said. “She’s been a thorn in the whole conference’s side for four years.”
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But after Le-Win was called for an illegal screen, Pecatonica (18-2, 3-1) ran over a minute off the clock, protecting the ball against Le-Win’s press, until Rager drove the lane and fed Casey Martin for a layup and a 39-35 lead with 18 seconds left. Junior point guard Kianna Degner (10 points) then stole the inbounds pass and added two free throws for the final score.
“They were really aggressive,” Le-Win coach Dennis Huttenlocher said. “We had seen them play against Aquin and knew their man defense was really good and really aggressive.”
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And now Pecatonica will probably remain in the state rankings.
“It’s very exciting,” Degner said. “We worked really hard for it and played our butts off for it. We were ready for it.”
Contact: mtrowbridge@rrstar.com, @matttrowbridge or 815-987-1383. Matt Trowbridge has covered sports for the Rockford Register Star for over 30 years, after previous stints in North Dakota, Delaware, Vermont and Iowa City.
This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Pecatonica girls ranked in state for first time but pushed to limit
