Lind’s late bucket lifts Morris girls past Rochelle

MORRIS – The last offensive play for the Morris girls basketball team Monday night was not drawn up for Mackenzie Lind.

But when the first option was closed off, Lind knew what to do with the ball. With the game against Interstate 8 Conference rival Rochelle tied at 26 with 17 seconds left, Lind received the inbounds pass near the top of the key and looked for teammate Alexis Johnson making a back-door cut. Rochelle had Johnson covered, so Lind dribbled down the lane and took a shot. She missed, but the 5-foot-10 senior got the offensive rebound and put up another shot. This one went straight through the hoop and gave Morris a 28-26 lead with six seconds left.

“The play wasn’t drawn up for me, it was drawn up for AJ,” Lind said, referring to Johnson. “When I saw that AJ was covered, I took it to the basket. At first, it was like ‘Oh, no, I missed it,’ but it came right back to me and I was in the right place at the right time.”

Rochelle had six seconds to get the ball up the court to try and tie the game, but Lind fouled the Hubs’ Lucy Bunger as she dribbled up the floor as the Redskins had not reached their foul limit. That forced Rochelle to inbound the ball again, and Morris still had a foul to give, so Maddy Shannon fouled on the inbounds pass to force the Hubs to take it out again with 1.2 seconds left. The Hubs could not get a shot off in the final 1.2, and Morris came away with the win to improve to 3-2 overall and 1-1 in the I-8 in their first game back from a COVID-19 quarantine.

“It felt good to be back on the court after being off for nine days,” Lind said. “We couldn’t even practice during that time. We brought a lot of energy tonight. It was definitely a team win. Everyone played well, and it feels really good to get a win against a conference team.”

Lind finished with five points, five rebounds and three blocked shots, while fellow senior Kyla Kjellesvik had team highs with 12 points and nine rebounds and Shannon finished with eight points.

It was the defense that carried the load for Morris, especially in the second half, when the Redskins held Rochelle to just seven points.

“Kyla Kjellesvik was a beast on defense tonight,” Morris coach Luke Windy said. “She chased their best player [Sofia Lukaitis] around all night and held her to three points. She and Mackenzie did what seniors are supposed to do in a game like this.

“I also thought we got some real good minutes out of our sophomores, Addison Stacy and Moriah Mayberry. They were aggressive on both offense and defense, and Addison showed a lot of improvement on defense just from the first half to the second half.”

Morris led 10-7 at the end of one quarter, trailed 19-16 at halftime and took a 22-21 lead into the fourth. Rochelle led 26-24 at the mask timeout at the four-minute mark of the fourth quarter, and the Redskins held the Hubs scoreless in the final four minutes. Kjellesvik made 1 of 2 free throws at the 2:54 mark and again with 1:59 left to tie the game before Lind hit the game-winning shot.

“Everyone stepped up and played well tonight, especially after being off for nine days with no practices or anything,” Windy said. “We were pretty well gassed at the end, but the girls kept playing hard and it was definitely a team win. Rochelle is a team that beat Kaneland by seven, and Kaneland beat us by 30, so this was a big win for us.”