NORMAL — On March 12 at the TaxSlayer Center in Moline, the Illinois State women’s basketball team was preparing for its Missouri Valley Conference Tournament opener the next day when Coach Kristen Gillespie gathered her players to inform them of the tournament’s cancellation.
And while the COVID-19 pandemic has continued to wreak havoc on athletics at all levels in the following months, the Redbirds are back together and “cautiously optimistic,” according to Gillespie.
“I think about that day a lot. It was so sudden. We had our best hopes, but it wasn’t enough,” said now-senior guard Paige Saylor.