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Gillespie, Central looking to right the ship 15 VIEWS Dick Goss
• Monday, January 5, 2015
In typical fashion, the two boys basketball teams congratulated each other Saturday afternoon after Joliet Central’s 67-39 victory over Joliet West. However, West coach Nick DiForti took an extra moment to talk with Central’s 5-foot6 senior point guard, Jerry Gillespie. “I told him he should play like that every game,” DiForti said. “We applied pressure to him, but he handled it.” And, he scored. Gillespie finished with 26 points on 9-of-14 shooting. He used his quickness to score on nice drives into the lane and his outside-shooting ability to hit 3 of 5 from 3-point range. West sophomore Trevian Bell finished with 12 points, and nobody else on either side reached double figures. “The big thing about Jerry is that he makes good decisions on the offensive end,” Steelmen coach Jeff Corcoran said. “He’s extra quick and can score. We need him to have the basketball in his hands. The thing he is working on, sometimes when the game gets really quick, he out-thinks himself.” Gillespie and his teammates struggled through a December they rather would forget. After going 4-0 in winning the WJOL Thanksgiving Classic, the Steelmen (8-5) were 3-5 in December. That included a 1-3 mark and a consolation-bracket sixth-place finish in the McDipper Christmas Tournament. The Central team that showed up Saturday against crosstown rival West – which also entered the game 7-5 overall and was coming off a positive showing at the Pontiac Holiday Tournament – was more like the one we saw at Thanksgiving. “At the McDipper, I think we underestimated some teams, and they beat us,” Gillespie said. “We came to practice every day this week, and the coaches were pushing us to get where we need to be.”
Photos by Larry W. Kane for Shaw Media
Joliet Central’s Jerry Gillespie drives to the basket in front of Joliet West’s Malcohm Hill (left) during Saturday’s game at Joliet Central. Central won, 67-39.
“I told the guys, ‘Let’s turn the calendar to January. December is in the past. We can play with people if we play the way we did [against West].’ ” Jeff Corcoran Joliet Central boys basketball coach
Joliet Central’s Ternell Jordan drives to the basket around Joliet West’s Teyvion Kirk during Saturday’s game. “I wanted to give them a day off, but to the kids’ credit, they asked to practice all three days [Wednesday, Thursday and Friday],” Corcoran said. The Steelmen, with no starter taller than 6-foot-1 and nobody in the regular rotation taller than 6-foot-2, are 3-1 in the SouthWest Suburban
Blue, where they certainly can be a factor the rest of the season. On the other hand, the league is unforgiving. “Our league is always rough,” Corcoran said. “But we know who we are. We had a bad December and a poor tournament in the McDipper. I told the guys, ‘Let’s turn the calendar to January. Decem-
ber is in the past. We can play with people if we play the way we did [against West].’ ” That Steelmen held the Tigers to 22.2 percent shooting and were so dominant they built a 32-point lead at 49-17 by late in the third quarter. All of that was accomplished without one of their top players, guard Taquan Sims, who was out for disciplinary reasons. Even without the full complement, however, if Gillespie runs the game and scores something like he did Saturday, Central will be heard from. “Coach [Corcoran] want-
ed somebody to be a vocal leader and control the team,” Gillespie said. “I have to do that. [Fellow guard] Ternell Jordan did a good job helping out on that, too. We played hard. Malik [Fuller], Kenyon [Woodfork], Kewon [Ware], they all stepped up.” Gillespie, who also had 26 points against Seton in Central’s only victory at the McDipper tournament, enjoys scoring points himself. What kid doesn’t? But he understands it is important he score within the flow of the offense. “We get out of control sometimes,” he said. “We have to make a slower push sometimes. I have to get better at making sure we do that, and our team will be better. “We have to take this game and learn from it. We have to get better every day.” Gillespie knows his role in the process, and he wants to make it work. Perhaps that bummer of a December can remain in the rear-view mirror.
• Dick Goss can be reached at dgoss@shawmedia.com.