Here's the bad news for the Naperville Central girls water polo team: Kara Wilson, the school's all-time scoring leader with 319 goals, including a school-record 106 this season and Sam Shamburek, the team's second-leading scorer with 53 goals just played their final game as a Redhawk.
Wilson was also the team leader in assists with 56, while Shamburek was fourth with 35 assists, including five this weekend at the state finals. The seniors combined for 12 goals and seven assists as they led Central to its first final four in school history.
The good news, The Heat Index thinks is that some of the others, the same ones that leaned on the seniors in the early going, have made it clear that 2008 was no flash in the pan.
"Haley Nelson really stepped it up," Wilson said. "She played great today. She did better than she'd ever done. And Emily Wooten stepped up. Tori Davis stepped up a lot. I mean Sam Virella played a great game. Everyone has really stepped up this year."
Sophomore goalie Sam Virella, sophomore Victoria Davis, junior Emily Wooten, sophomore Claire Fleming and junior Haley Nelson have produced all season, so this isn't some big surprise that they balled at state finals. The Heat Index is just saying, they were doing it in a much more alpha manner.
Virella made 26 saves over three games and was in net for the program's first state quarterfinal victory, a nine-save effort on Friday in a 11-8 win over Loyola.
The field players combined for 14 goals 13 assists with Fleming and Nelson scoring seven and five goals, respectively. Against McAuley, Fleming had four goals and two assists, while Nelson had three goals in that game and four assists against Stevenson.
"Claire had a fantastic weekend," Central coach Jeff Plackett said. "Sam Virella, she had a strong weekend as well. Sam I think really started to peat in the last couple weeks of the season, which is what you need to have happen. Hopefully, this will make them hungry to come back and take shot again next year."
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