A wild 66-63 overtime win over Princeton marked the last North Harrison girls district basketball title, back in 1996-1997. That team, coached by Mike Schmidli at the time, featured Jill Wilcoxson, Korissa Cox, Jodi Craig, Chandra Saksek, Tracy Parkhurst, and others.
Jill Wilcoxson was one of the best post players North Harrison ever produced; everybody looked up to her, and she was a dependable threat to score every game. She is the all time leading scorer at North Harrison with 1,963 points, ahead of Payton Craig and Haley Craig. Tracy Parkhurst was a prolific threat to score from long range; in the first game of the 1997-1998 season, she locked horns in an epic scoring duel with Becky Fletcher (Worth County); Fletcher had 33 and Parkhurst had 31, and Worth County came away with a 63-61 win.
Chandra Saksek moved in and came out that year, and brought instant energy to a team that was already solid going into the 1996-97 campaign. Unlike many players who have to be coached to be more aggressive, she erred on the side of aggression; she was a constant threat to score on offense and a constant disruptive threat on defense. In softball, she was the kind of player who could swing and miss wildly at a pitch, and then turn around and crush the next one.
North Harrison was 17-9 coming into the game, but that was misleading as the HDC was strong on the girls side that year. They had Gilman City, who was a solid team; Cainsville had Karen Skroh, who scored 40 points in a game once and could constantly slash to the rim; and Ridgeway, who was showing improvement under Tom Hogan and who could beat anyone on a given night. Pattonsburg was also solid that year and was capable of lighting up the scoreboard on any given night.
North Harrison beat Cainsville 50-35 to get to the District Finals at North Harrison; Saksek had 15, Wilcoxson and Parkhurst had 12 each.
Princeton had beaten the Shamrocks in Gilman City earlier that year, and they were sporting their best team since Amy Krohn, a four year starter at Northwest, and her teammates graduated; they came in at 24-2. They had beaten North Harrison in Gilman City, but it was North Harrison who jumped out of the gates as Talia Kinder, normally a role player, had the hot hand early. Parkhurst kept the Blue Tigers off balance with several steals during the game.
But Princeton kept hanging around and the Shamrock lead was one point, 53-52, late in the fourth quarter. Korissa Cox hit two free throws and Jill Wilcoxson scored to make it 57-52, but then Princeton fought right back to tie it at 57-57 and send it to overtime.
Jodi Craig scored for North Harrison to put them up 61-59, but Tina Gibson tied it back up for Princeton at 61-61, and the Blue Tigers got the ball back. But with 47 seconds left, Chandra Saksek picked off a Princeton pass and turned it into two free throws and then added two more. Korissa Cox added a free throw with six seconds left as the Shamrocks hung on for the 66-63 victory.
Jill Wilcoxson had 19 points, Chandra Saksek 16, and Tracy Parkhurst 14.
The Shamrocks have not won districts since then, although they came close. Both times, in 2003-04 and in 2017-18, Worth County barred the way, turning back the Shamrocks in overtime in the District Championships.
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