Holiday Tournament Roundup: Top-seeded Mustangs, third-seeded Chargers to meet for championship

BEARDSTOWN, Ill. — Unity girls basketball coach Brad Begeman needed to see how his players reacted to being in a dogfight.

Their first foray was successful. The next one is already on tap.

Forced to go to overtime against Brown County in Wedneday night’s semifinals of the Beardstown Lady Tiger Classic, Unity’s Taylor Nichols made the second of two free throws with 5.3 seconds remaining to secure a 52-50 victory and advance to the championship game of the 24-team tournament.

The top-seeded Mustangs (13-1) will face third-seeded Illini West (14-1) at 7 p.m. Thursday in the high school gym. The Chargers advanced with a 40-32 victory over second-seeded Havana in the first semifinal.

“I told the girls after the game if we want to go anywhere (in the postseason) we have to have games like this,” Begeman said. “Claire Rabe is one of my assistants and she told them, ‘You’re going to be in gyms that are so loud and where there’s a lot of pressure. So this is great.’

“We survived. We needed challenges like tonight where we had to tough it out.”

Expect the same against the Chargers.

Illini West is allowing just 26.7 points per game in its three tournament victories. The Chargers held the Ducks to just four field goals in the second half Wednesday night and gave up just one field goal in the final three quarters to Havana’s top two threats — Taryn Wickman and Josie Hughes.

The Chargers’ Hallie Ray limited Wickman to 10 points and no field goals after the first quarter, while Illini West’s Caydee Kirkham held Hughes to five points and scoreless in the second half.

“Hallie did a great job,” Illini West coach Grant Surprenant said. “Just another senior who stepped up and took it upon herself to get the job done. That’s what you expect from a senior group that’s been in big games.”

Kirkham led the Chargers with 21 points, and Reagan Reed added 11. In the fourth quarter, after getting fouled while scoring, Reed had to go to the sideline with an injury. Illini West senior Abbie Johnson came in and made the free throw — her only point in the game.

“She’s a senior who understands the moment,” Surprenant said of Johnson. “She came in and gave us a cushion.”

The defense did the rest.

“We have to play hard as a team and execute,” Surprenant said. “When you play four games in four nights, you have to execute your game plan, you have to take care of the basketball and you have to play defense and get stops in crunch time.

“Since the first game of this tournament, we’re buckling down defensively as a team and guarding the ball.”

It won’t be as easy against a team as balanced and explosive as the Mustangs.

Junior forward Ashlynn Arnsman led Unity with 22 points and 11 rebounds, while Kyra Carothers added 11 points and Brooklyn Stiefel had 10 points — all in the second half.

Klare Flynn led Brown County with 19 points, going 9 of 9 from the free-throw line, and Gabby McGath scored 15 points in what could be a preview of a future postseason matchup between two of the area’s top Class 1A teams.

“If we play 10 times, I realistically think it’s a 5-5 split,” Begeman said. “They match up with us on our strengths, and we match up with them the same way. It’s two teams when they play each other you know it’s going to be a good game.”