Featured

Lady Miners are 1-1 in County Tournament

Published

12 years ago

January 19, 2012

BenGil Staff

Haylie Kirkwood attempts to shoot over two defenders.

Standing on a 6-12 record, the Lady Miners entered the Macoupin County Tournament where they have finished less than their best the past couple years. The County tournament marks the halfway mark for the basketball season and as most of the teams have already played each other, it boils down to who defeats who in the County Tournament. The tournament opened January 14th at Mt. Olive High School and the Miners first game was against Carlinville. Beating the Cavaliers by only a handful the first time, the ladies dominated almost the entire game and took their first game of the tournament.

Led by Shelby Jarman and Tyler Ross in the first quarter, the ladies established an early lead and carried it through until the end. Both Ross and Jarman tallied four points each in the first quarter as Burns, Manalia, and Morris all put forth an additional two points to total 14 points in the quarter. It was a great start for the Miners as they were able to hold Carlinville to just 8 points on the defensive end. Again returning to the full court trap defense, the Miners were able to pick up countless turnovers from the Cavaliers in the white jerseys Saturday afternoon.

Leading by 6 points at the start of the second quarter, the girls were able to widen their lead by halftime. The same strategy applied in the second quarter for the Miners in the black jerseys. Coach Gray attempted to slow down the offense and only take open shots. The game plan was a success as the ladies spent most of their time on the offensive end in the second quarter and throughout the game. Burns and Morris led the offensive end as they each had a field goal and a made free throw. Three other girls combined for the other seven points as the Miners scored 13 in the second quarter. Holding the Cavaliers to just 8 again, the Miners had an 11 point lead at halftime.

In control of the game 27-16, the Miners had a rough third quarter as the bench saw a lot of rotation. The girls kept up their full court defense and tallied another 7 steals in the third quarter. Out of the seven steals, only one was traded for an easy lay-up as the team struggled putting the ball into the basket. Five of the eleven points in the third quarter came from the free throw line where the girls shot 77% for the day. The other six points came from inside the paint. Scoring just eleven points, the ladies were still able to hold Carlinville beneath them as the Cavaliers scored ten. Cassidy Downs led the team with four points in the quarter, but the team still struggled handling the ball while they trailed 38-26 entering the fourth quarter.

Molly Gray looks around the defender for someone to pass to.

The fourth quarter was the lowest scoring quarter of the game and perhaps the year as the Miners scored just six points in the eight minute period. As the Miners scored six, the Cavaliers scored just one point the entire quarter! Luckily the Lady Miners can play twice as hard on the defensive end as their scoring capabilities vary between quarter to quarter. After holding the Cavaliers to just one point in the quarter, the girls took their first victory in the tournament with a 44-27 score. Scoring leaders were: Shelby Jarman (14), Alexis Burns (7), Kayli Morris (5), Haylie Kirkwood (4), Tyler Ross (4), Chelsea Gill (4), Loni Nicole Manalia (4), and Ellen Gray (2).

After stealing the ball 23 times in the game against Carlinville and totaling 10 assists, it was an entire different game Tuesday evening when they took on Bunker Hill. The Minutemen could handle the ball better the Cavaliers, so the turnovers would not come as easy for the Miners. Bunker Hill also had a slight height advantage over Haylie Kirkwood and the Miners. After grabbing nearly 35 rebounds in the game against Carlinville, the Miners were lucky to grab nearly 20 in their second of the tournament as the Hlafka sisters were out for a win.

The ladies started out the game strong in the first quarter as Chelsea Gill posted five points after her field goal and big three pointer. Sophomore point guard Ellen Gray not only led the team with the ball, but carried the team with four points in the first quarter as well. The girls used all their resources in the first quarter as they turned the ball over just a handful of times. The other four points came from Kayli Morris and Alexis Burns who had two points each respectively, but the game would soon switch hands in the second quarter. With a seven point lead at the beginning of the second quarter, the Minutemen lit it up before halftime.

Kayli Morris grabs the rebound and dribbles the ball out to start the offense.

Led by Stumpf with seven points and the Hlafka sisters with the other six, Bunker Hill was able to fight back and close the deficit as they held the Miners to just 5 points in the quarter. Posting nearly six turnovers in the second quarter, the Miners did not have much to work with on the offensive end when they made it down. With 19 turnovers in the game, the Miners struggled against the Bunker Hill defense and trailed by just a single point after the first half.

With 16 minutes left in the game and only a one point lead, the Miners knew it was not going to be a cake walk in the second half. A cake walk it was not as Bunker Hill came out of the locker-room shooting lights out. The Minutemen posted 15 points in both the third and fourth quarters to not only trim the one point lead, but also take control of the game and hold it to the end. The Miners scored 10 in the third quarter and were only down by four points entering the fourth quarter, but they sputtered from there as they could only score just 2 points in the fourth quarter to take the loss 47-30.

Chelsea Gill led the team in points with 10 while Alexis Burns put forth 7. Ellen Gray was leader in steals as she grabbed 5 and added 6 points to scoreboard. Kayli Morris, Shelby Jarman, and Loni Manalia, who led the team with 2 assists, put forth 2 points each for the ladies while Tyler Ross added 1 point.

Winning one game and losing the other, the Ladies will now play tonight, January 19, at six o’clock in Mt. Olive. The girls are 7-13 on the season now with a 5-4 record in the conference.

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Featured

Gillespie man injured in DUI accident

Published

9 years ago

October 16, 2015

BenGil Staff

Genisio's Ford Mustang in the City of Gillespie's impound lot Tuesday morning.

A Gillespie man was taken to a local hospital after suffering injuries following a single-vehicle accident that occurred Sunday morning, October 11, after he drove off the roadway and into a deep ditch near the intersection of Route 16 and Charles Street in Gillespie.

Gillespie Police Chief Jared DePoppe reported that the police department was dispatched to the scene of the accident shortly before 3 a.m. Officers arrived to find Jonathan Genisio, 29, of Gillespie as the driver and only occupant inside the Ford Mustang vehicle.

Genisio was arrested, but give a notice to appear in court so he could seek medical treatment. He was charged with six different counts in addition to having his vehicle impounded. His charges include driving under the influence of alcohol, no insurance, improper lane usage, failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident, failure to notify SOS of an address change and failure to wear a seat belt.

At the time of publication on Thursday evening, the vehicle was recovered from impound and Genisio was discharged from the hospital. The extent of his injuries was unable to be released by medical personnel.

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Community News

Gillespie council discusses budget and meeting process

Published

9 years ago

August 1, 2015

BenGil Staff

Treasurer Dan Fisher (right) addresses the council.

The treasurer for the City of Gillespie had a lot to say about how city officials handle their subcommittees and how city funds are spent during the city’s committee meeting held Monday evening, July 27.

Dan Fisher, the elected treasurer for Gillespie, spoke to the council for over 30 minutes about how bills are paid and more importantly, how purchases are appropriated for and planned. During the city’s board meeting held earlier this month, Fisher suggested the council move their meeting dates to coincide with how the bills are paid.

He explained that many council members bring up issues or have questions about certain bills during the council meetings, but the questions are left to be answered by the city clerk who isn’t present at the board meetings. In addition to dragging out the meetings, Fisher said the questions should be taken care of before the meeting is held.

“We need to have a standardized process on how we buy things,” Fisher told the council Monday evening. “We need to spend more time on appropriating.”

We need to have a standardized process on how we buy things

Fisher distributed a “Budget Basics” packet to board members during the committee meeting held Monday and said the council should consider implementing a purchase order system to account for all purchases. “That way when the bills come in, we can match the form up with it and everyone knows what the purchase was for and what account it comes out of,” he clarified.

Council members agreed with what Fisher had to say to them. “We need to spend a lot of time when do our appropriation and it’s going to take a lot of time from everyone, including myself,” he continued. “We need to find a way to be collective in how we do things.”

Fisher closed by adding that the council also takes too long at their regular city council meetings, which are held on the second Monday of each month. Speaking of the city’s July meeting that lasted nearly 3 hours, Fisher said the council needs to be much more “business-like”.

“We take too long at our meetings,” he closed. “It’s been proven that people lose focus after 90 minutes and there is no reason why we shouldn’t be able to get a meeting done in 1 hour and 15 minutes.”

City clerk Frances Smith spoke up after Fisher referred to the council’s last meeting. She prefaced her statement by saying she didn’t intend to saying anything, but continued by saying that the council’s July 13^th meeting took her three days to transcribe. “It makes the clerk’s job hard – whoever it is,” she said. “There is a lot of side conversations and it’s very hard to hear on the tape.”

Ash Street Project

Alderman Steve Kluthe informed the board that he received the bid specifications back for the Ash Street Project which allows the council to advertise the specs to get an idea how much drainage project will cost.

Kluthe said the bid specifications cover everything including equal opportunity employer and prevailing wage information, but said the project could probably be handled by a local contractor. The project includes installing a culvert that will transfer the water to Cherry Street.

The council hopes the completed project will then alleviate the water that currently gets backed up north of Ash Street. “They are going to put a culvert underneath Ash Street to the north and grade the ground on the north side so the water flows to the culvert and down to the south end where there is a storm drain,” Kluthe explained.

TIF District

We should stretch the money out and begin to reinvest the money into community development

Fisher informed the council that the tax bills for the TIF district went out and the city can expect to receive close to $60,000. He reminded the council that even though the city made a big payment to United Community Bank last year in excess of $90,000, there will still be a payment made to UCB for their portion paid into the TIF until the TIF expires, which Fisher said is 12-14 more years.

After the city pays UCB, Fisher said the council can expect to still have somewhere north of $40,000 remaining each year. “I would like us to start to look at other projects that meet the TIF criteria that we could spend $20-$30,000 per year,” Fisher explained. “Long-range projects – projects that could last 10-12 years. We should stretch the money out and begin to reinvest the money into community development.”

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