Girls Basketball: Maine South falls to powers

Maine South played the toughest two-game schedule Saturday at the Sweet 16 tournament, and the Hawks paid for it with two losses to top-five teams.

But the No. 8-ranked Hawks hung tough in both, losing to No. 3 Trinity 44-30 in the afternoon and No. 4 Marist 54-41 in the evening at Lake Zurich.

“No matter the results, this is going to make us a better basketball team having gone through this experience,” said Maine South coach Mark Smith, whose club lost for the fifth time in six games to drop to 21-6 overall.

Maine South and Marist went through eight lead changes in the first half before the Redhawks ran away with the game in the third quarter.

JeTaun Rouse had the first basket of the second half, and Marist outscored Maine South 17-4 in the third quarter to lead 41-27. The Redhawks led by 10 or more the rest of the game and raised their record to 25-1.

“Our defense. That was the key,” said Rouse, who scored a game-best 17 points. “We picked up the intensity. Our defense created our offense. That’s what we do.”

Unlike against Trinity and Niles West on Friday, Maine South had no more answers in the second half. The Hawks simply ran out of gas.

“We are not making excuses about that, though,” Smith said.

Maine South looked alive in the second quarter when it traded leads with Marist. Mackenzie Duffy’s three-pointer midway through the quarter even gave the Hawks a 21-19 advantage.

But Claire Ryan’s three-pointer with 2:23 to go in the first half returned the lead to the Redhawks for good at 24-23.

Marist then went on a 13-2 run to start the second half that featured scoring from five players. Maine South was limited to one field goal in the third quarter.

“We made some adjustments on defense,” Marist coach Mary Pat Connolly said. “We played smarter and tighter. We tightened up our defense to create offense.”

Leah Bolton followed Rouse with 16 points in the win. Duffy finished with 14 points for the Hawks, but she scored only three in the final two quarters. Nina Duric added 13 points. Michelle Maher, who was scoreless against the Blazers earlier in the day, scored nine.

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