It wasn’t always pretty, but the Bolingbrook‘s regional mastery continued.

Sydney Dodd led a balanced scoring attack with 13 points and added 10 rebounds as the Raiders shook off Lockport for a 53-32 victory Thursday evening in the Class 4A Yorkville Regional title game.

Bolingrook (26-4) will face top-seeded Benet Academy on Tuesday in the opening semifinal of the East Aurora Sectional.

“We had the definition of winning ugly,” Bolingbrook coach Chris Smith said. “We missed double-digit free throws and layups. But give Lockport credit, they forced us to work.”

The Raiders (26-4), who were playing in their 25th straight regional title game, are now 23-2 in those games, only losing in 2001 and 2014. The last time Bolingbrook didn’t play for a regional championship was in 2000. This was the program’s 11th regional title in a row and 23rd since 2002. There was no postseason in 2021.

“Yeah, a regional title should be expected,” Smith said. “We always play with a target on our back, and our sectional is the toughest in the state.”

A good start was the key in the latest regional championship game.

Bolingbrook raced out to a 6-0 lead before Laura Arstikaitis (eight points) hit a 3-pointer for the Porters with 5:16 left in the opening quarter. But that was only one of eight field goals on the night for Lockport (23-10).

Then Dodd, a junior forward, scored four straight points to start an 8-0 run as the Raiders led 14-4 after one quarter.

“We prepared for the game, and we prepared well,” Dodd said. “The start was pretty big. Coach harped on us to play defense, defense, defense. That led to our offense, and I always try to get a double-double.”

There was defense and sloppy play by both teams in the second quarter as they had nearly as many turnovers (six apiece) as they did points. The Porters momentarily got within seven points on a 3-pointer by junior forward Evelyn Ingram, who led the team with 13 points. The Raiders, however, led 22-11 at halftime.

Lockport scored 10 points in the third quarter to pull within 29-21 after three, but the Porters also had eight of their 24 turnovers in the quarter.

The fourth quarter started with a 6-0 Bolingbrook run. The Porters didn’t quit, getting within 37-29 on a short jumper from Arstikaitis with 3:04 remaining, but the Raiders scored 16 points in the final 2:36 to pull away. Junior Skylar Wakefield (12 points) had six of them in that stretch.

Senior guards Natalie Frempong and Kennedy Williams each had 10 points. Also, A’mya Simmons (six points) scored in that run. The team sang “Happy Birthday” to her afterward as she celebrated her 17th with a regional championship.

“It feels good,” Simmons said, “but this is stage one, though. It’s nothing new to win a regional. We are looking for bigger and better.”

Lockport has gotten bigger and better in the past two seasons, as it was playing in back-to-back regional championship games for the first time since playing in five straight between 1998 and 2002. Arstikaitis and Addie Way (three points) are the only seniors for the Porters.

“We have 51 wins in the last two seasons, and I’m very proud of the program,” Lockport coach Darien Jacobs said. “We knew we couldn’t afford to make the turnovers, but we never gave in, worked hard and tried to keep it competitive.

“Hats off to Bolingbrook. They executed defensively, and that’s what they’re great at.”

This was only the second postseason meeting between Lockport and Bolingbrook in the past 25 years. The other was a Class AA sectional semifinal game in 2007, which the Raiders won 70-24 en route to a second-place state finish.

But after committing 18 turnovers against Lockport in the regional, they know they have to play better if they are going to reach that level.

“It’s big, it’s a tradition and an expectation for us,” Dodd said of winning a regional. “Now we have to focus on the sectional and make our free throws.”