Plainfield East Rallies in Fourth to Beat Romeoville

For three quarters, the Romeoville girls basketball team’s heart and hustle allowed it to control the game against Plainfield East.  But basketball games are four quarters, and one lackluster frame proved to be the difference in .

Plainfield junior guard Jawan Straughter had a strong second half, and his two free throws with five seconds remaining helped Plainfield East complete the comeback.  The Bengals then hung on for their 13^th win of the season. 

“The first half I was just trying to get my team in it, the second half I knew people were tired so I could go to the basket and if I didn’t have a good shot I could drop it off.  But I was trying to be aggressive for my team,” Straughter said.

Romeoville came out hot, hitting three shots from 3-point-land in the first quarter.  Dejounte Lincoln scored six points, and his 3-pointer at the end of the first quarter gave Romeoville a 20-17 lead. The Spartans continued hitting from the perimeter in the second, and Nate Washington made a series of plays late in the quarter to keep Romeoville on top.  He hit two free throws, connected on a pull-up jumper and had a rebound and putback that made the score 34-30 with less than two minutes remaining in the half. 

But Plainfield East matched Romeoville point-for-point in the second quarter and went to the intermission down 36-33.

“It was what was there, we had the hot hand and hit some open shots. It was good for a change. Last game, we were a little cold, so we kicked it up a little bit.  We scored 36 points in the first half, we don’t usually do that,” Romeoville Coach Jeff Bambule said after the game.

Romeoville continued to dominate in the third quarter and steady play from senior point guard Antwon Hill helped the Spartans extend their lead—Hill grabbed three rebounds and found Lincoln for an open layup that gave Romeoville an eight-point lead with three minutes to go in the third.

“Antwon did a great job handling the ball and I thought he did a pretty good job on [Dee Brown], he came out on fire.  I thought Antwon did a pretty good job holding him down after that start,” Bambule said.

But the Bengals turned up their defensive intensity in the fourth quarter and the two teams traded baskets until Des’Nique Harris’ layup gave Plainfield East the lead with 2:20 left in the game. 

Romeoville responded with a driving jumper by Donald Miller and Hill found Lincoln for another layup to put the Spartans up 57-54 with 1:32 remaining.  Plainfield’s Austin Robinson hit a jumper to cut Romeoville lead to one, but Hill came up with another big play, scoring on a fast break layup with 55 seconds remaining to give Romeoville a three-point lead. 

Two free throws by Straughter pulled Plainfield to within one point, and Romeoville couldn’t take advantage of opportunities to finish the Bengals off. 

Jaylen Nunn, Bo Goshorn and Hill each missed the front end of one-and-one foul shots, and Nick Samuelson fouled Straughter with 5.3 seconds remaining to set up the game winning free throws.

Plainfield has won three straight and Coach Branden Adkins believes the win streak has a lot to do with his team’s confidence.

“I think they just started believing that they’re a good team.  They believe in the skills they’ve got and they believe in each other.  They felt they really hadn’t earned a lot of respect so they kind of made it a point to get respect.  Now they’re starting to figure things out among each other and understand the level of basketball they’ve got to play.  They’re just playing together a lot better,” Adkins said.