Hononegah takes out Titans to advance to State

SUBMITTED PHOTO The Herald
The Hononegah girls basketball team celebrated their win at sectional competition.

Hononegah takes out Titans to advance to State
By Chris Johnson
REPORTER
It has been many years since the Hononegah Lady Indians have achieved the level of success that they have this season. A win over NIC-10 rival Rockford Boylan on Thursday, Feb. 21, in the Belvidere North Class 4A Sectional Title Game, by a score of 68-53, propelled the Lady Indians into the Streamwood Class 4A Super-Sectional, which was played on Monday, Feb. 25.
Hononegah faced suburban Wheaton-Warrenville South to earn the right to advance to the State Finals last weekend at Illinois State University, with Final Four play scheduled to begin Friday, March 1 at Redbird Arena.
This year was one that has seen the Lady Indians play through the NIC-10 as the “team-to-beat.” Every program knew Jordan King and her gang of talented shooters were going to be tough to stop. Boylan was very aware of it and had to work almost harder than they have all season to knock back the Lady Indians in the team’s Jan. 10 showdown. The Lady Titans took that night by seven, 66-59. It gave the Lady Indians their only conference loss of the season. They wouldn’t lose again this year though.
Hononegah’s NIC-10, 17-1 record gave it the conference champion status. However, Boylan sat with them with the same one-loss mark because of the earlier season win over the Lady Indians. Hononegah has since redeemed itself for the early-January defeat to Boylan.
They beat back the Titans twice since then. It began as the regular season closed on Feb. 9, as they came away with the 25-point victory, 73-48. They were playoff ready well before their showdown with their southerly rival and refined the skills needed to win in the “big games” even before 2018 came to a close.
The best test of the post-season began at Christmas time as they battled into the Dundee Crowd Holiday Tournament. While readying themselves for the holiday break they ran into a former State Champion and a few of the most talented teams from the Chicagoland area.
Peoria Richwoods was first up, and they utilized speed and hot-shooting to topple the Lady Indians by eight, 64-56. It gave the team its only loss of the year, at that time, and halted a 14-0 start to the 2018-2019 winter sports season. Programs from Fenwick and Maine South also put on display their own set of skills as they helped give the Lady Indians back-to-back losses for the only time this winter. Just three games later, Boylan rode the wave of Lady Indians’ misfortune and captured its only win over their co-conference champs this season. Since then, the Lady Indians have rolled and that has led to a season closing stretch of 13 wins in a row and has included Regional and Sectional trophies.
Hononegah’s Elite Eight position will whittle to the Final Four with a win on Monday. Teams from Lisle (Benet Academy) and Oswego battled to join them on Monday, as did historic programs such as Chicago-Mother McAuley and Rock Island and Des Plaines and Lake Forest.