Girls Basketball: Hinsdale Central, Hinsdale South clash in postseason

Hinsdale Central and South travel to the South Side for a first-round playoff game.

What we know about Hinsdale Central and South from the second game of the season remains about the same entering the postseason.

Hinsdale South is built to win now. The Hornets, with four senior starters, clinched their first West Suburban Gold title since 2004 with an upset win over Proviso East Feb. 3. After the clincher, Hinsdale South was ranked for the first time this season by YourSeason.com and began the week at No. 22.

Hinsdale Central is looking to the future. The Devils finished fourth in the West Suburban Silver and have pretty much used only one senior starter, forward Lauren Pavich, for most of the season. Freshman point guard Gabrielle Rush has started every game and freshman Sydney Griffin has been getting more playing time since the middle of the season.

The two District 86 teams clash at 8:10 p.m. Feb. 14 in the Class 4A Simeon Regional semifinal. The Hornets (19-5) are the fifth seed in the Lyons Sectional and Hinsdale Central (9-14) owns a No. 12 seed. The winner likely plays fourth-seeded Proviso East (20-8) at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 17 in the Simeon Regional final.

The IHSA’s mysterious computer formula determines regional assignments. The Hinsdale schools were pushed out to Simeon since the Wolverines are a 13th seed and hosts Proviso East. The other regional hosts in the sectional include Trinity, St. Ignatius and Proviso West.

Before meeting in the playoffs, Hinsdale Central and South have two remaining regular season games to play. Hinsdale South travels to West Suburban Silver champion Proviso West at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday and then hosts No. 6 Benet (22-4) at 7:30 p.m. Friday.

“They are definitely a quality team. We have our hands full with them,” Hornets coach Jen Belmonte said of Benet. “It will prepare us for the whole sectional and probably the whole regional. Ending the season with rough games like Proviso West and Benet should prepare us. I prefer that way to finish.”

Hinsdale Central hosts Downers Grove South in its conference crossover game Wednesday and plays at Downers North at 7:30 p.m. Friday.

Belmonte has not been able to scout Central recently, but Devils coach Tom McKenna watched Hinsdale South’s 46-42 loss at Metea Valley Jan. 25. It was the Hornet’s only loss in the month.

“I’ve told people all year; Hinsdale South is a really good team,” McKenna said. “Then went 11-1 in their conference. I have always been impressed with them. They have good players and No. 30 [Andrea McNally] is a good shooter.”

The Hornets have won nine of their last 10 games and defeated the Devils 48-36 Nov. 18 in the second game of the season at the Hinsdale South Thanksgiving tournament. Uzo Okoro scored 18 points in that game while both teams combined to shoot 2-of-21 three-pointers.

Lily Sarros scored a game-high 22 points for Central. That was Sarros’ career high until she scored 23 points against Oak Park-River Forest Dec. 16 and against Glenbard West Jan. 21.

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