Morton’s Lady Potters 60, Galesburg 16

It was 16-2 when Galesburg’s coach, Evan Massey, called his first timeout. Barely five minutes into game, he wants a timeout. Sixteen seconds later, Massey asked for another. Successive timeouts mean a coach suspects his team is in trouble. When he calls those timeouts 16 seconds apart, it means the coach knows there’s big trouble and there’s no way out of it.

Soon enough, the score was 27-5.

Then 52-11.

Relentless domination has become the Potters’ theme. They were so good everywhere tonight that it’s impossible to say it was an extraordinary offensive performance or an extraordinary defensive performance. Call it a tour de force at both ends. Now 18-2 for the year, the Potters are on a run during which they’re winning by nearly 30 a night.

I thought to ask Massey about the Potters.

“I don’t have time right now,” he said, hurrying to do a post-game radio show.

As he left his locker room later and headed to a Potterdome exit, I called out, “Coach?”

He didn’t stop. So I went to his radio guy, Tom Meredith, for a summary of Massey’s thoughts.

“He said Morton’s defense didn’t let us get into a flow,” Meredith said. “And every time we made a mistake, Morton capitalized on it. He also said Morton is an elite team and we’re a second-tier team.”

No wonder he wanted those timeouts.

On defense, the Potters did make life miserable for any Galesburg player who thought to do anything with the ball, such as throw a pass, catch a pass, take a shot, or be so brash as think of taking a shot. “Timid and scared,” Morton’s Tenley Dowell said in assessment of the Silver Streaks’ offense. Did Galesburg’s best shooter, so unfortunate as to be defended personally by Dowell, even get off a shot? “Maybe one, but it wasn’t a good one,” Dowell said. She spoke with such a sweet little killer smile.

Offensively, as always, Dowell was an elegant attacker, scoring on driving, curling, sneaking-over-the-rim layups delivered softly against the glass with either hand. As they do to most all comers lately, the Potters took Galesburg’s breath away with a transition game that moves so quickly even its practitioners can’t keep up – as we see here in a reporter’s exchange with Morton’s littlest starter, 5-foot-4 Maddy Becker . . .

Reporter: “You even got a rebound and got it to Megan Gold for a spin move layup.”

Becker: “No, I didn’t.”

Reporter: “You did.”

Becker: “Uhh…”

Reporter: “My notes, from 4:38 of the third quarter: ‘Maddy reb, pass, Gold LU.’”

This was not Morton winning big over a Mid-Illini Conference mediocrity. This was Morton winning extraordinarily over a school with a great coach and a distinguished history in girls basketball. The coach, Massey, in his 41st season, was elected to the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame 19 years ago. Back then, young Bob Becker was in his second season as the Morton coach, a neophyte who’d seen Massey and Galesburg in the Final Four at Redbird Arena. That year set his ambition running hot. Becker wanted to create a program like Galesburg’s, so good that its legitimate goal every year was a trip to Redbird.

Becker has done that and more, his Potters winning state championships in 2015, ’16, and ’17, years of success that in 2017 earned him his own place in that IBCA Hall of Fame.

And he’s not done yet. After this game – the first in Potterdome history matching Hall of Fame coaches – Becker was euphoric. There’s no other word for a coach who says, “This team could be in the midst of a really special, special year.” When your resume includes three state championships, it’s a big deal when you say your current team can create a “really special, special year.” He is talking about a fourth state championship in five seasons.

Becker saw good things done everywhere tonight, from his starters through the nine-man bench. Lindsey Dullard starred at both ends, the 6-foot-1 junior scary-good on defense and working both at point guard and inside with confidence born of repeated success. With three 6-footers in the starting lineup – Dullard, Dowell, and the precocious freshman Katie Krupa – Morton has the long, lean look of a basketball team that can beat you any way you choose to be beaten, from inside or outside, on the run or out of sets, and it can always win with defense that leaves the poor, poor enemy trembling in its sneakers.

Becker loves the team’s chemistry, too. “They’re all smiling,” he said. “Even Maddy. You see her throw up an airball 3? And she smiled about it.”

Really, Maddy, a smile on an airball?

In answer, she laughed.

Dowell led Morton’s scoring with 15. Dullard had 11. Krupa had 8, Becker and Gold 6 each, Peyton Dearing 5, Claire Kraft 4, Bridget Wood 3, and Addie Cox 2.