Not to worry, dear reader, we will get to the basketball in this basketball story. We will account for the Lady Potters’ latest championship. They won their own Thanksgiving invitational Saturday with two victories, 47-17 over Champaign Thomas More and 50-35 over Peoria Richwoods. The scores deceive. The first game wasn’t that close. The second was too close.
Explanation is coming.

But first . . .

About 9:45 Saturday morning, the smoke alarm went off in the Morton High School gymnasium. The sound was accompanied by flashing lights around the Potterdome. Someone called the fire department, and a couple minutes later someone called the fire department to say, “Never mind.” By then, I recognized the problem. More often than a guy should admit, I, too, have set off the smoke alarm while making popcorn.

The Potterdome concession folks had started their morning preparations for the Potters’ Thanksgiving Tournament crowd. I believe it is a law that no basketball game can be played inside the village limits unless popcorn is popped. So someone tossed popcorn into the popping machine and turned on the necessary electric juice. Then everyone walked away – only to return, coughing, as smoke curled to the ceiling.

Turns out you burn the popcorn if you forget to put popcorn oil in with the popcorn.

Been there, done that.
Many years ago, I learned better than to do a meandering, direction-less start to a story. I was told that readers have lots to do. An editor said, “I could knit a sweater from dryer lint before you get to the point.”

So I usually start quickly. Not today. Nope. We all could have died in a popcorn fire. Think about that. But we survived. What’s the rush, then, to get to the point? Let’s celebrate. Let’s deal here with interesting stuff that usually gets put at the end of basketball stories, such as – yes! – women referees.

Two women worked Morton’s games, one in the morning, one in the championship game. I’ve always thought it odd that so few women are basketball referees, particularly in women’s games. I asked both the women why that was.

“Meanness,” the morning woman said. She believes spectators say things to women referees that they don’t say to the men.
The second referee laughed. She said, “They don’t like getting yelled at.”

I love Things You Learn While Learning Something Else. Talking to the referees, I learned about uniform rules in girls’ basketball. I’d seen a referee go to the Potters’ Brandi Bisping during pre-game warm-ups and order a change of head-bands. Bisping switched from red to black – because head-bands must match the color of a player’s knee pads. Also: Spandex shorts must match head-bands Also: undershirts must match head-bands and knee pads.

Huh? Really?

“Really,” the second woman referee said. “We’re the uniform police.”

Here’s another interesting thing that getting-to-the-point-in-a-rush might cause us to miss: an out-of-town coach’s assessment of the Potters. Because the tournament brought in teams along I-74 from Danville to Champaign to Normal to Morton to Peoria, the games attracted maybe a dozen college and high school coaches. One said, “Morton’s coaching is as good as it gets. And those girls play hard and unselfishly. I just love the unselfishness. They play the game the way it’s supposed to be played.”

OK, now we’re talking basketball. To leave Thomas More in arrears not to mention out of breath, the Potters went on a 20-0 run in eight minutes of the first half for a 33-7 lead. The sophomore Tenley Dowell, a star on the rise, scored 12 of those game-deciding points – on a floater in the paint, two fast-break layups, a put-back, a jumper from the top of the key, and two free throws.
Afterwards, I asked the Thomas More coach, Tom Garriott, whose Prairie Central teams lost to Morton in the Potters’ two state-championship seasons, how this year’s group compared to those.

“Same,” he said. “Disciplined, deep, and they all can shoot.”

Dowell led Morton with 16 points. Bisping had 13, Lindsey

Dullard 9, Josie Becker 5, and Jacy Wharram and Courtney Jones had 2 each.

Peoria Richwoods did a nervous-making thing against the Potters. Though it never led, Richwoods used a mobile and hostile 2-3 trapping zone to force the Potters into ball-handling errors and hurried shots. The Potters built an apparently comfortable lead at 29-16 midway through the third quarter. They did it suddenly, with three 3-pointers in 1 1/2 minutes – one by Becker, two by Dowell.

But Richwoods made the Potters uncomfortable by scratching within seven early in the fourth quarter, 31-24. Again, the Potters moved away, this time on a 3-pointer by Kassidy Shurman and another 3 by Dowell. And yet Morton led only 40-33 with 3 1.2 minutes to play. By then, Richwoods was forced to foul and hope Morton missed free throws.

But the Potters closed it out with a 10-2 run, the last six points coming at the line.

Dowell had 19 points, Bisping 12. Caylie Jones 6, Dullard had 5, Shurman and Becker 3 each, and Jacey Wharram 2.

Morton is now 5-0, winner of 18 straight games going back to last season, winner of 27 straight in the Potterdome, and winner in 71 of its last 77 games.

Three basketball factoids out of the four-game tournament: the Potters’ defense gave up as many as 12 points in a quarter only once, to Richwoods. . . . meanwhile, the Potters made 34 3’s (by 6 players) . . . which means Morton scored 102 points on 3’s while opponents scored only 120 on everything.

Now, before watching “Saturday Night Live,” I’m going to make some popcorn. Wish me luck.