Eagles get clipped

Jacobs' Sierra Dunner dribbles towards the hoop in the first quarter against Hononegah during the Class 4A McHenry Regional Final on Thursday. Hononegah won, 54-48. (Lauren M. Anderson - landerson@nwherald.com)

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McHENRY – Thursday was, in so many ways, a microcosm of Jacobs’ girls basketball season.

The Golden Eagles had ground out plenty of close games, battling back and overcoming adversity.

Thursday simply marked the first time the Eagles faced a barrier they could not knock down.

Second-seeded Hononegah pulled out a 54-48 win against the top-seeded Eagles in a double-overtime thriller to win the Class 4A McHenry Regional title.

The loss ends an otherwise stellar season and career for six seniors.

“I’m proud of our ladies,” Jacobs coach Ed Haugens said. “This was really an example of our season. We’ve been in a lot of close games and a lot of different situations like the one we were in tonight and unfortunately tonight ... we were climbing a hill and we couldn’t quite get over it.”

Jacobs never led in regulation and tied the game on senior guard Maria Tamburrino’s astonishing three-pointer with 39 seconds left in the fourth quarter to cue the first overtime.

It was a vindication moment of sorts for Tamburrino. She had gotten into foul trouble early, nabbing three in the first quarter, but still managed to score a game-high 17 points in her varsity finale.

“We battled back the whole game and we knew we had it in us to keep coming back,” Tamburrino said. “We had to fight real hard the whole time, but ... we were prepared and fought the whole way.”

If the rest of the Eagles’ shots had gone in as effortlessly as Tamburrino’s, it might have been a different game.

Jacobs (26-6) went 14 for 22 from the free-throw line and despite shooting relatively well from the field (19 of 47, 40 percent), Hononegah shot better (13 for 29, 45 percent).

“We knew that if we were going to win this game, we couldn’t run and gun with this team,” Haugens said. “A couple more shots go in, a couple more rebounds, and it could have been different.”

The Indians (20-11) put the Eagles in a hole early, leading by seven, 13-6, at the end of the first quarter thanks to 6-foot-3 sophomore center Nicole Smith, who scored seven of her 15 points.

Jacobs got down by as much as 13, 22-9, in the middle of the second quarter, but used an 11-3 run to close the first half trailing by five, 25-20.

The Eagles outscored the Indians 25-20 in the second half. Hononegah did not score a field goal for the final 14 minutes of the game – not during the final six minutes of the fourth quarter or in either overtime session – and perhaps forced both the first and second overtime sessions because the Indians took the air out of the ball for long stretches of time but could not convert when it came time to run the offense.

But Hononegah iced its win from the free-throw line, going 8 of 11 in the second extra period.

“We beat a great team tonight,” Hononegah coach Randy Weibel said. “They are talented and very well-coached. We were very glad to get the win.”