Carrollton Hangs on to Beat Panthers in Lady Hawk Invite Quarterfinals

CARROLLTON – The Carrollton Lady Hawks hosted their closest geographical rivals from about 10 miles south in the quarterfinals of the 51^st Annual Lady Hawk Invitational Wednesday night.

A back-and-forth game came down to the wire, but it was the hosts who survived and advanced, beating the Jerseyville Panthers 44-42.

It was a second-round matchup that Carrollton head coach Brian Madson wasn’t thrilled about, but one he figured would come.

“When all the seeds started coming in, I saw the matchups, and I was like, ‘Man, I don’t want to do this.’ But that’s how it is,” he said postgame. “I didn’t want to play them, but it’s always good having that rivalry game for me personally. It was a little tougher than I wanted it to be, but we’ll live.”

The Hawks were assigned the number two seed in the 14-team bracket, with the top two seeds, top-ranked Liberty (20-4) being the other, earning first-round byes.

That meant an elongated break for the Hawks, who hadn’t played in nine days since a 61-27 win over North Greene on Monday, January 19.

“It was good having that break,” Madson said. “We had to knock the rust off tonight, but I think the girls played good enough to win.”

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The Hawks came to play.

But the Panthers came for a fight.

Wednesday’s game saw eight lead changes with Carrollton in control for the majority of the night. It got off to a 5-2 start thanks to baskets from Tessa Price and Brookelyn Eilerman as well as a free throw from Chloe McAdams, forcing Jersey into a timeout midway through the first.

Out of that break, the Panthers went on a 7-2 run to take the lead at 9-7. Cali Breeden knocked down a three to tie it at five, Neely Goetten’s basket tied it at seven, and Meredith Gray’s first points of the game made it 9-7 Jersey.

The teams traded the lead, but a triple from Hayden McMurtrie gave the Hawks a 13-11 advantage after one. Carrollton maintained the edge at halftime, leading 26-20.

Jersey opened the second quarter with a three from Gray and a basket from Goetten to cut the deficit to 26-25. Carrollton called a quick timeout and then went on an 8-2 run to boost the lead back up to 34-27.

But the Panthers came back swinging, closing the quarter on an eight-point run, sparked by Chloe Beemer’s three and capped off by a basket from Anna Kribs that gave her team a 35-34 lead after three.

The teams traded the lead once more before Blake Driskill’s basket restored the advantage at 40-39 for the Hawks. They’d push the lead to 44-39 before a three-pointer out of nowhere from Beemer made it a one-possession game.

Jersey immediately called a timeout to draw up a play with seven seconds left in the game. That play was kick it out to Beemer, whose three at the buzzer was an inch too strong as the Hawks held on for the win.

“From my angle, I thought it was in. It was a heartbreaker,” Jersey head coach Caleb Williams said of the game’s final shot. “She’s in the locker room right now beating herself up over it, but I had to remind her she was the one that hit that shot to get us back within two [points] for those last five seconds. I told her there’s a million different plays that happen in a ballgame that can make it go either way.”

Beemer finished the night with six points on two threes. The Panthers were led by Meredith Gray with 13 points, pushing her career total to 1,806. She needs just 13 more points to become the leading scorer in program history. Goetten added 10 points on the night, Breeden had seven, and Kribbs had six.

“I could not be more proud of them for the way they played tonight and the effort they had,” Williams continued. “With the way the weather has been here lately, we haven’t touched a basketball in three days before today. What we were able to do tonight with that, without refining everything, getting ready for a big game like that, I’m extremely proud of them.”

Madson knew that Jersey would come looking for a fight.

“I love Caleb to death. He’s always going to have his girls ready to play,” Madson said of his opposing head coach. “He doesn’t want to lose to me, just like I don’t want to lose to him. So, I knew they were going to be physical. I think it started early, Brooklyn [Eilerman] and Meredith [Gray] kind of getting into it a little bit.”

It was physical, but it wasn’t dirty. Neither team had to worry too much about foul trouble.

It was just a night of missed opportunities for Jersey. Opportunities that have been a common theme, missed layups. There were multiple times on Wednesday where Jersey would get out on a fast break, sometimes too fast for its own good, and missed open layups.

“I dwelled on layups early on in the season, because that’s kind of been one of our stories, is we have missed a lot of layups,” Williams said. “But I try not to dwell on it anymore, because if I dwell on it, then the girls are dwelling on it.”

He preached that the mindset is always about the next shot.

The Panthers see a four-game win streak snapped as they fall to 15-10 on the season.

Carrollton keeps its eyes on the prize, the program’s first Lady Hawk championship since 2004, when the Hawks beat Jerseyville 47-38 in the final.

“We keep telling the girls one game at a time,” Madson said. “We’ll reach our goal if we take care of business just a game at a time.”

Driskill led all scorers with 16 points on Wednesday, followed by Lake Hadley with 10. McAdams had seven, McMurtrie had five, and Eilerman had four.

The Hawks will have to get past West Central (18-7) in the semifinals on Thursday, January 29 at 7:30 p.m.

“They’re loaded,” Madson said of the Cougars. “They’ve got a lot of great shooters. We have a game plan coming into tomorrow, but it’s definitely going to be a quick turnaround with only playing six girls tonight. But they’re kind of in the same boat. Should be a good game tomorrow.”

The teams haven’t played their Western Illinois Valley Conference game yet, that rematch coming quickly after the Lady Hawk on Monday, February 2 in Winchester.

The two teams met twice last season, Carrollton winning the WIVC game at home 69-51, and the Hawks prevailing again in the IHSA Class 1A regional semifinals by a score of 78-66.

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