{"id":36186,"date":"2016-03-09T13:19:18","date_gmt":"2016-03-09T19:19:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=36186"},"modified":"2016-03-09T13:28:05","modified_gmt":"2016-03-09T19:28:05","slug":"notre-dame-ends-evanstons-bid-for-state-basketball-title","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/notre-dame-ends-evanstons-bid-for-state-basketball-title\/","title":{"rendered":"Notre Dame ends Evanston\u2019s bid for state basketball title"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Julia Cardi<\/strong><\/p>\n

Trying not to cry, Nojel Eastern contorted his face after he missed his second-to-last free throw. With the top-seeded Evanston Wildkits trailing the fourth-seeded Notre Dame Dons by nine points late in the final quarter, the junior point guard knew his team wouldn\u2019t go to the state championship. The Wildkits fell in the sectional semifinal Tuesday, ending their season with a 68-56 upset loss.<\/p>\n

Evanston was hoping to duplicate its first matchup against Notre Dame: 71-64 victory. Instead, they finished 22-6, while the Dons (24-6) will play in the sectional final Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll four of our seniors are such high-character and high-value teammates,\u201d a somber Coach Mike Ellis said after the game. \u201cThere are a lot of underclassmen who are disappointed that they didn\u2019t get it done for the seniors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Senior Dylan Mulvihill left the locker room with puffy, reddened eyes. Junior Malik Jenkins fixed his downcast eyes on a spot past the reporters, and despair weighed on his normally confident voice. \u201cWe feel like we let the seniors down,\u201d Jenkins said. \u201cIt\u2019s on every underclassman that played tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Jenkins finished with 11 points for the Wildkits, and Eastern scored a game-high 27. But no other Evanston player added more than five.<\/p>\n

Depth on the bench, normally a strength for the Wildkits, crumbled against Notre Dame\u2019s powerful guards. Lucas Simon, Matt Stritzel and Jeameril Wilson led scoring for the Dons. Simon and Stritzel each contributed 14 points, and Wilson added 13.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe thought that would be our advantage \u2014 to wear their guards down, knowing that we\u2019re a deeper team,\u201d Ellis said. \u201cBut there\u2019s a difference between wearing down and finishing plays.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eastern missed a pair of key free throws in the fourth quarter with Evanston trailing 55-53.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it would have been a lot different had I tied it,\u201d Eastern said softly. \u201cI got the steal, but [the ball] went out of bounds. It was tough.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Ellis pointed to the Wildkits\u2019 play in the first half as the team\u2019s downfall. In the second quarter, Evanston shot 28 percent compared to Notre Dame\u2019s 63 percent.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t come out in the first half with the intensity we needed to play,\u201d Ellis said. \u201cWe weren\u2019t able to focus possession by possession. We didn\u2019t\u2026fulfill those opportunities to score when the game got tight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ellis said he hopes the loss will motivate them for next season. \u201cI would\u2019ve liked to have brought that up tonight, but tonight\u2019s not the time to talk about that. I think that\u2019d be disrespectful to the four seniors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jenkins doesn\u2019t want to go through the same heartbreak in 2017. \u201cSeeing the seniors\u2019 faces in there, I don\u2019t want to feel like that as a senior next year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photo at top: The Evanston Wildkits face the flag during the national anthem before what turned out to be their last game of the season, a 68-56 sectional semifinal loss to Notre Dame. (Julia Cardi\/MEDILL)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Julia Cardi Trying not to cry, Nojel Eastern contorted his face after he missed his second-to-last free throw. With the top-seeded Evanston Wildkits trailing the fourth-seeded Notre Dame Dons by nine points late in the final quarter, the junior point guard knew his team wouldn\u2019t go to the state championship. The Wildkits fell in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":241,"featured_media":36195,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,585],"tags":[597,1944,328,1438,1439,1048,1746,2189,1679,1441,192],"class_list":["post-36186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","category-winter-2016","tag-basketball","tag-dylan-mulvihill","tag-evanston","tag-evanston-wildkits","tag-high-school-basketball","tag-high-school-sports","tag-julia-cardi","tag-malik-jenkins","tag-mike-ellis","tag-nojel-eastern","tag-promo"],"yoast_head":"\nNotre Dame ends Evanston\u2019s bid for state basketball title - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/notre-dame-ends-evanstons-bid-for-state-basketball-title\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Notre Dame ends Evanston\u2019s bid for state basketball title - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Julia Cardi Trying not to cry, Nojel Eastern contorted his face after he missed his second-to-last free throw. 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