The Wolves Sail Past the Vikings in Varsity Girls Basketball Game

Niles West varsity girls’ basketball team won against Niles North in the breast cancer awareness game on  Jan. 17th, 2023. The game was a very big deal to the Wolves due to the ongoing rivalry between the D219 schools in the past couple of years.

“Honestly, this game against North was probably the most important game of our season. The obvious reason being they’re our rivals, but the more unknown reason is the fact that we lost to them last year. This year we wanted it to be a different story, it was our home court and our chance to win the trophy back. That was the goal leading up to the game, so we did everything in our power to make sure it happened,” senior Mia Cejovic said.

Senior Maja Applequist reflected on West’s confidence against rival North, having a winning mindset, and ready to take the trophy home.

“Our team definitely wanted the win against North. We came into the game confident and ready to do whatever it took to win. We both have well-rounded teams. Even though they had a little more height than us, we were able to lock down their taller players and come out with the win. North always shows up ready to compete so we had to come out stronger,” Applequist said.

On par with the high team spirit and the great team spirit were the many successful assists between the players.

“We all had a lot of assists during the game, which shows our teamwork. We would all get excited when someone completed an assist, [which] kept the energy high and positive for the whole game,” sophomore point guard/shooting guard Katelyn Daly said.

Senior Aashi Shah believes their win didn’t only come from the work the girls put in, but also because the Wolves have great team chemistry.

“We flowed so well together as a team and I think we all have a connection this year. Our conference games have always been tough, but we’ve never once given up. We still have a couple more games to go and we’re going to finish the season strong,” Shah said.

As the West dominated all four quarters, not giving North a chance to catch them, Cejovic describes her favorite part of the game as the end of the third quarter when West went on another winning streak.

“We knew their roster and were ready for any challenges that came our way, now we just had to execute. And that we did. Offensively and defensively the team as a whole did everything we talked about in practice and implemented it in the game. My favorite part of the game would have to be the end of the third quarter cause North had just gone on a six-point run, we called a time-out, and after two minutes we scored another eight points. There was just such great energy and it really reminded me why I play basketball in the first place,” Cejovic said.

Overall, this was a very successful game for the wolves and the trophy is back where it belongs.

“I’m very proud of how our players responded during the Niles North game.  We knew going into the game that Niles North was going to play hard and we couldn’t let them dictate how we wanted to play.  Our game plan was to play like us and we did exactly that.  We had our best shooting percentage of the season (38%) and assisted on 15 of our 21 field goals during the game.  We are really coming together and playing our best basketball in the second half of the season,” coach Kyle Braheny said.

West is very happy to have the trophy back at home and is ready to finish the season strong. Join the girls for their senior night, on Jan. 24 to cheer them on.