NAPPANEE — After handling the Lakeland Lady Lakers 60-45 Friday night, the Whitko Lady Wildcats are a win away from their first sectional championship. Standing in the way of that potential title is back-to-back sectional champion NorthWood, which defeated Tippecanoe Valley 84-61 in Friday’s other Sectional 21 semifinal at NorthWood High School. “NorthWood, in my opinion, is one of the best two or three Class 3A teams in northern Indiana,” Whitko coach Brandon Bradley said. “It’s going to be a dogfight tomorrow night.” NorthWood’s strength is in the middle, where 6-foot senior Morgan Olson has been dominant in her team’s two sectional games. In the postseason, which includes Wednesday’s 68-38 win over Wawasee, the Youngstown State-bound Olson has tallied 45 points on 17-of-23 shooting. Matching up with Olson will be 6-foot-1 senior Jordan Hall, who’s also been performing well in the sectional. After scoring two points, but grabbing 15 rebounds in Tuesday’s 49-46 win over West Noble, Hall had 14 points and 10 rebounds against Lakeland. “She’s finished this season very strong,” Bradley said. “Around Christmas break, she was around seven points and six rebounds a game. Now, she’s in double-figure scoring and she’s up over eight rebounds a game. She’s been more and more consistent, but she’ll need to come ready to play (tonight). The nice thing is, she tends to get up for better players.” Against Lakeland, a lot of Whitko players came to play, as four finished in double-figure scoring. Led by Hall’s 14-point, 10-rebound game, Whitko also got 15 points and eight rebounds from freshman Aly Reiff, as well as 12 points and nine boards out of sophomore Jennifer Reiff and another 11 points from freshman Brianna Cumberland. Jumping out to an 8-0 lead on the nine-win Lakeland team that reached the semifinals through a first-round bye, Bradley saw his girls let up a bit. “We had a lot of turnovers and a lot of sloppy turnovers,” he said. “All year long, I’ve told them, ‘I don’t care if we have a high turnover rate, as long as we’re being aggressive toward the rim.’ Tonight, we stood up too much. We got comfortable.” Whitko finished the game with 18 turnovers, but seemed to lose some of the fire it started with, even though it still managed to build the lead to as much as 18 points in the third quarter. Never really threatened by the Lady Lakers, Bradley knows that won’t be the case tonight at 7:30 p.m. against NorthWood. Knowing what’s on the line, Bradley doesn’t want his team, which starts two freshmen and a sophomore, to come in tight. “The message I left them with was, ‘We’re in a sectional championship game. It has happened for Whitko. It hasn’t happened often. So, enjoy it,’” he said.
