Girls Basketball: Lake Zurich wraps up Sweet 16 with flourish
BY BILL PEMSTEIN Contributor January 30, 2012 10:42AM
Lake Zurich's Renee Wojcik grabs a rebound during Saturday's win over Fenwick in the Sweet 16 Tournament. | Rob Dicker~Sun-Times Media
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Updated: March 3, 2012 8:24AM
Standing 5-foot-8, Lake Zurich High School senior Renee Wojcik is listed as a forward on the girls basketball team.
She’s more the size of a guard, but knows that she needs to help her suddenly hot club succeed by playing up front.
“I have to rebound,” Wojcik said. “We don’t have a tall team, so someone has to do that. I also have to play solid defense.”
These are very good times to be a Lake Zurich girls basketball player. With a senior-laden lineup, the Bears (17-9) notched a pair of wins in the Sweet 16 Tournament, which finished up on LZ’s home floor Saturday. Most impressive, though, was a 74-65 win over Fenwick, a 19-game winner that scored 100 points in a game this season.
“That was a really good game (Saturday),” Wojcik said. “We had three good practices, and we’ve played great in five out of our last six games. We are gaining momentum.”
Wojcik also noted that her team is having fun off the court as well. The Bears took in a meal at White Alps in Lake Zurich prior to beating Fenwick.
Clearly, the win might rank as the team’s signature victory heading into the postseason. LZ head coach Chris Bennett recalled a number of fun games from the past against Fenwick coach Dave Power and his high-scoring squads.
“We’ve had some great games with them,” Bennett said.
This season’s Bears may not have the star power those squads had, but the team is really coming into its own at the right time of the year. It would be hard to top that fourth-quarter performance on Saturday.
On a spinning shot by Dori Darras (16 points), the score was knotted at 50-50 early in the fourth quarter. The Bears added another 24 points in the last six minutes of the game.
There was Stephanie Schmid hitting three-pointers on the way to 17 points. Cathryne Spear (16 points) began finishing at the basket, as she added eight points in the frame. Point guard Maisie Cox (12 points) scored on a three-point play, and finished with 12 points.
The tie turned into a double-digit Lake Zurich lead within a few minutes.
High five: Does anyone in the Palatine Sectional want to play Lake Zurich? But the big question will be, can this team beat Stevenson?
By Bennett’s math, Stevenson has beaten Lake Zurich eight times in a row.
Lake Zurich is the fifth seed in the Palatine Sectional, and will host a regional on Feb. 14. Stevenson will be in Lake Zurich that night, taking on high-scoring Lena Munzer and Highland Park.
Lake Zurich and struggling Mundelein meet at 8 p.m. Feb. 14. The two winners meet in the regional title game on Feb. 16.
Recap: The Bears weren’t as impressive in the first game of the day on Saturday. Lake Zurich trailed Providence Catholic 29-21 at halftime but rallied to take a 45-44 victory. Schmid led the offense with 16 points.
Darras (11 points) and Spear (8 points) also helped out.
In earlier Sweet 16 action, the Bears fell to New Trier 50-45 on Jan. 23 while they downed host Maine West 50-45 on Jan. 24.
In the win over Maine West, LZ went 14-for-16 at the foul line in the fourth quarter to seal the win. Spear led the Bears with 12 points. Schmid scored 11, while Cox added eight points.
On the schedule: The Bears host Lake Forest at 7:30 p.m. Friday.
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