With about three minutes left in the third quarter of Buffalo Grove’s Friday night game against rival Elk Grove, it became undeniably clear that the Bison couldn’t stop senior forward Diamond Boyd.
Soon after it was clear that they couldn’t win the game either, and the ultimately fell 60-51.
“Diamond’s a great basketball player,” Buffalo Grove coach Steve Kolodziej said. “But the bottom line is we let her have 31 points, and I would say about 27 of those were pretty easy points. We talked about trying to take her away, but we didn’t execute our game plan.”
Boyd was a dominant force in every quarter, scoring on an array of layups and floaters that went largely uncontested after her initial move in the post. Bailey North was the unfortunate Bison player matched against her, and the talented senior forward couldn’t do much to slow her down on this particular day.
“I’ve known Diamond for three years and I’ve gone against her in AAU,” North said. “She has good teammates that get her the ball, and she doesn’t really have to do anything fancy because her teammates help her out.”
North led Buffalo Grove with 10 points and was a big reason why they were tied 29-29 going into the half. Freshman guard Maddie Welter came off the bench and hit two huge threes in the second quarter when the Grenadiers were attempting to pull away.
In the end, however, Boyd was too much, and midway through the third quarter Elk Grove was able to mount a 10-point lead that the Bison could never quite chip into despite a spirited fourth quarter effort.
“That third quarter we just couldn’t get a bucket and they had about eight,” Kolodziej said. “In general we shot well from the field, but we turned the ball over too many times. When you turn the ball over 20 times you’re not going to be many teams, especially a quality opponent like Elk Grove.
