Belleville East girls punch ticket to 4A State Finals with gritty win

Down by five quick points, a couple of blown layups and turnovers in their first three-minute repertoire, it looked like it would be one of those “just happy to be here, we’ll learn from this and be better next year” nights for the young Belleville East Lancers girls basketball team Monday night.

No sir and no ma’am.

The Lancers turned up the defensive pressure, started making those layups they missed earlier and accomplished something no team in school history had until this one: The Lancers are going to the Illinois High School Association state tournament Final Four after beating Homewood-Flossmoor 54-47 in the Class 4A super-sectional championship at the Shirk Center on the campus of Illinois Wesleyan.

The Lancers (28-5) will play in the 4A seminfinals against the Nazareth High School Roadrunners (31-3) at 2:30 p.m. Friday on the campus of Illinois State University.

Looking at Lancers sophomore Hailey Gray afterward, you wouldn’t have guessed the Lancers had just been through a pulse-pounding last few minutes, after the Vikings had trimmed an 11-point Lancers lead down to four points with 1:35 left. Still casually chewing the gum she did the whole game, Gray (a team-leading 17 points) said there is nothing to be shocked about: Belleville East is going to state for the first time.

“I don’t think we were ever nervous,” Gray said. “We lost our discipline a little bit at the end, but we kicked it back in. We were like, ‘This is what we need to do, and this is how we’re going to do it.’ And that’s what we did.”

Gray exemplified the Lancers’ cool after the jittery start. Not only did she start making some shots and dishing the ball for assists, she played very good defense throughout. So did her sophomore teammates, such as Ramiyah Young and Vanessa Stacy, along with 6-foot freshman Kendall Butler.

The Lancers, coached by Shardae King, started creating turnovers off the press and forcing the Vikings into tough, contested shots. After a first quarter in which the Vikings led 13-8, the Lancers hit the Vikings with a 23-11 second quarter to gain a 31-24 halftime lead.

“I think they were a little nervous at the start, but you never know with this group. We do have a tendency to start off slow sometimes. I think that’s their youth. But it’s a work in progress and they turned it around,” King said. “They turn it up when they need to turn it up.”

Gray, who already is starting to get some recruiting interest from colleges, is a terrific ballhandler. Despite heavy defensive pressure from outstanding senior Vikings guard Aunyai Deere, Gray drove effectively to the basket for points and also hit two 3-point field goals.

She distributed the ball well after the quarter, particularly to 5-foot-8 guard Young, who had 11 points and grabbed a couple of clutch rebounds in the final two minutes when the Vikings looked to have the possible game-turning momentum.

“Playing together as a team, and everyone knowing their roles, is definitely key for us,” Young said. “This feels really good, because we’ve been working on this since summer. Our hard work has really paid off, and it showed on the court.”

Junior Audree King chipped in five points for the Lancers, with DeAsia Willis adding five. Stacy had six points, both early 3-pointers, and Butler added six.

Deere and Laila Williams each had 14 points for the Vikings, who also have a fairly young team. These two teams may meet again, in other words. It will be the Lancers, though, who can call themselves the team more experienced in winning on this stage.

“I think defense was a big factor for us tonight. If we give our all on defense, we get a lot of offense from that,” Gray said. “Our goal all year has been to make state. It feels very good, but we just have to be even better for the next one.”

This story was originally published March 2, 2026 at 10:02 PM.