Spartans' star burns Dixon

DIXON – Call it a coachable moment.

After the Dixon Duchesses’ 41-30 setback to Sycamore on Tuesday at Lancaster Gym, their first-year coach Luke Ravlin took some extra time in the locker room to repeat himself.

In prepping for the Northern Illinois Big 12 crossover clash, he’d practically painted a bull’s-eye on Bailey Gilbert. But the freshman sharpshooter still poured in 21 points, 16 coming in a second half that saw the Spartans run away with the game.

“It’s not a secret that Bailey Gilbert can shoot the ball - we knew that going in,” Ravlin said. “We’ve talked all year about the fact that you can’t let a good player get started. You have to make them do something other than their strength. Once she hit a few, we couldn’t cool her off.”

“Coach told us specifically what to do – we knew [Gilbert] was a shooter and he told us not to leave her, especially when someone else drives,” Dixon senior Becca Hendley said. “We knew what was going to happen, and we just didn’t follow through with what coach told us, so next time we’d better listen to what he tells us.”

Sycamore (12-12) rattled off a 11-0 run to open the second half to seize a 24-13 lead. But the Duchesses absorbed the body blow and came back with a 9-1 counter punch. Catie Cox drove to the rim, followed her miss and cashed in with contact to set up a three-point play that made it 25-20. A runner by Brooke Bailey cut the lead to three.

But then Gilbert went bonkers during a 13-0 knockout blow. She lost Kacie Dillow and Emily Rains on consecutive possessions with a deft head fake, setting up pair of 12-foot jumpers, one from the right elbow then another from the baseline.

“That’s something she’s gotten better at just recently,” Sycamore coach Brett Goff said. “She was just known as a 3-point shooter up until a few weeks ago. But now she’s looking for her shot and creating her shot.”

Gilbert capped the run by splashing her fourth 3 of the game from the right angle. A 3 by Liz Greenwalt ended the run, but Gilbert immediately swished her fifth and final three from the left wing to make it 41-27 in the waning minutes.