A HERO’S SANDWICH
Highland’s Chloe Churilla honored with sportsmanship pin from IHSAA and ... a free sub from Jersey Mike’s
Highland’s Chloe Churilla was among five players on the ground.
The senior forward, one of her teammates and three players from Bishop Noll — including junior guard Mariah Robinson, Churilla’s former AAU teammate — had crashed to the floor in pursuit of a loose ball.
As Noll gained possession and play moved to the other end of the court, Churilla was most concerned about the other players’ well-being.
“We were helping each other up and asking, ‘You good?’ Churilla recalled. “It was more important to make sure everybody was good than whatever was going down on the other end of the floor.
“Everybody took a hard fall. It was just good to make sure everybody was OK and nobody was hurt. That’s more important — making sure you come out of there not injured than two points, a layup on the other end.”
For her display during that sequence in Highland’s Dec. 14 win against Noll, Churilla was recognized by the Indiana High School Athletic Association with a sportsmanship pin and a free sub from Jersey Mike’s.
“That was nice,” Churilla said. “Those are the things, aside from basketball awards, those are the cool things to be awarded for. It’s bigger than basketball.”
To be sure, Churilla also has accrued plenty of basketball honors during her career with the Trojans, including leading the team in scoring for a third straight season.
This winter, she’s averaging 15.8 points and a team-high 8.8 rebounds. She averaged team highs of 15.8 points and 7.5 rebounds last season.
First-year coach Darian (Patton) Straughter, who spent four seasons as an assistant at Merrillville, already has gained an appreciation for Churilla.
Getting to 1,000 career points is within the realm of possibility.
“Chloe has been playing great for us,” Straughter said. “I cannot remember a game where she has not produced. Even if it’s not in points, she always produces in another area for us.
“When she’s playing well, our whole team plays well. Her teammates respect her because she shows up every night and gives her best effort.”
Churilla takes being a multis
port athlete to the extreme. Not only does she play volleyball in the fall, she’s also a sprinter in swimming in the winter along with basketball.
“I usually go to some swims in the morning — not every day, but when I can make it,” Churilla said. “It’s basketball in the evening, and then I’ll go to some swim meets after basketball practice in the evening. With school and everything, sometimes it’s hard to do it. But it’s really fun. I love swimming.
“Basketball usually takes priority over swimming. But we’re a swimming family, and to be able to go out there and compete, I’m really thankful all of my coaches allow me to do that.”
Churilla competed both in the swimming sectional and a weather-delayed basketball sectional semifinal on the same Saturday as a freshman. Highland didn’t reach a basketball sectional final either of the last two seasons.
With the swimming sectional and basketball sectional final scheduled for Feb. 5, Churilla is hoping to be in the position to have to make decisions this season. She believes Highland has the ability to advance that far.
The Trojans (9-4) have won six straight games. Straughter, whose brother Bo Patton is Merrillville’s boys coach and husband Chris is a boys assistant at West Side, was on maternity leave for six weeks with the birth of her son. She coached the first two games of the season and returned Monday, ahead of wins Tuesday against host LaPorte and South Bend Riley in a tournament.
In between, assistant Tracie Mezera-Juarez, River Forest’s career scoring leader and Highland’s coach for nine seasons through 2017-18, filled in for Straughter. The last time the Trojans finished above .500 was Mezera-Juarez’s final season, when they went 13-10.
“We’ve started to get in our groove and we’ve been able to pull out some big wins here,” Churilla said. “We can carry that throughout the rest of the season.”
Churilla also has impressed Straughter off the court.
“Chloe is very quiet and humble,” Straughter said. “One of my challenges for her was to be more vocal this season because of how quiet she is.
“She’s a great kid. She never complains. She’s does whatever we ask her to do to the best of her ability. She’s one of those kids that you wish to have every year. Not only is she great on the court, she’s great in the classroom.”
Churilla plans to study biomedical engineering in college while playing basketball. Rose-Hulman and the Illinois Institute of Technology are two of the schools she’s considering.
“I would love to coach her for another three years,” Straughter said. “But I look forward to seeing her at the next level.”