ILLINOIS GIRLS PREVIEW: LIC girls chasing Paris, as usual
Nov. 20—Predicting a winner in Little Illini Conference girls high school basketball is pretty easy, according to Scott Zane.
"It is Paris's conference until someone can prove otherwise," the Robinson coach told the Tribune-Star recently.
"We look forward to defending our six-year run as conference champs," coach Dave Tingley of Paris said in agreement.
As the Illinois girls enter their second week of competition, here's what the Wabash Valley teams can expect.
* Marshall — Hall of Fame coach Kathy Miller retired after a 21-7 season last winter, but there's still a coach Miller in charge.
That would be Heidi Miller, better known to girls basketball historians as the former Heidi Dahnke, four-year leader of probably the best team in Martinsville (Ill.) history who went on to play at Illinois-Chicago.
The Lions have one of the best post players in the LIC returning in senior Abi Scott, while junior Libby McFarland and sophomore Zara Engledow were also regular players a year ago.
Others in the mix for Marshall, which lost a close game to Tuscola and routed Chrisman in its first two games of the season, are junior Sophie Smith and sophomores Tuesday Pearce and Addison Oetjen.
"I'm excited for my first year as high school coach," Heidi Miller said. "I've coached all of these girls [eight years as junior high coach] so it's fun to already know the girls and know what they can do." The Lions compete this week at the Robinson Thanksgiving Tournament.
* Paris — The Tigers, undefeated after defeating Terre Haute North twice in the process of winning their North American Lighting Tournament, were 28-5 last year and reached the sectional championship game.
Although Paris lost two college-bound shooters — Kate Littleton and Mady Rigdon — from last year's team, it also has four seniors returning who have plenty of starting experience: Kaitlyn Coombes, Deming Hawkins, Trinity Tingley and Kendra Young.
And, as is usually the case with Paris, that's not all.
"We are a very deep team and will be able to play pressure defense and spread the ball around on offense," coach Tingley said.
* Robinson — The Maroons were 18-7 last year, Robinson's first winning season in girls basketball since 2009, and were very young while accomplishing that.
The four returning starters are all still juniors, in fact: Marisa Zane (15 ppg, 5.7 rpg, 4.5 apg, 2.6 spg), a first-team all-LIC player; Elizabeth Shea (8.9 ppg, 8 rpg), a second-team all-conference player; defensive ace Alexia Zane (7.6 ppg, 4.7 rpg), honorable mention all-conference as a sophomore; and Katelyn Jones (6.2 ppg, 4.9 rpg), expected to have a breakout year according to coach Zane.
Second-leading scorer Lucy List (9.5 ppg), "also the team leader/mother to the younger players," her coach said, was the biggest graduation loss, but juniors Taylor Blank and Raegan Manhart and sophomore Annie List return to complement the returning starters.
Robinson heads into its tournament undefeated after wins over Newton (a nonconference game) and Dieterich last week.
* Conference outlook — Casey was 3-27 last season and has started 0-3 this winter with losses to South Central, Shelbyville and ALAH, but is expecting improvement as the year goes along.
Olney and Mount Carmel, along with Robinson, will be hoping to challenge Paris, and Marshall might also be a factor. Newton is in the middle of the pack, while Lawrenceville — like Casey — has a little farther to go.
