Boys Basketball: Lake Park takes down Metea Valley

Updated: February 8, 2012 10:22PM

Lake Park was in a bad mood after blowing a late lead and losing to Waubonsie Valley in overtime last Friday.

Dominique Spencer made sure history didn’t repeat itself Wednesday night. The 6-4 senior forward played a great all-around game, scoring 23 points to go with six rebounds and two steals to lift the host Lancers to a 60-57 victory over No. 13 Metea Valley in Roselle.

The result kept Lake Park in contention for the Upstate Eight Valley championship, while denying Metea Valley’s bid to clinch at least a share of the title.

“This is pretty big for us because we’re back in the conference race,” Spencer said. “We closed it out with confidence. Coach [Josh Virostko] told us before the game that we need to believe, so we did believe and we did it.”

Spencer sank both ends of a one-and-one with 22.4 seconds remaining to put the Lancers (16-6, 7-3) ahead 59-54.

“I just believed,” Spencer said. “I just believed that I was going to knock them down and I knocked them down. Coach told me to believe and play with confidence and that’s what I did.”

Metea Valley (20-3, 9-2) closed to 59-57 on a three-pointer by Kenny Obendorf, then forced a turnover with :09 left. The Mustangs, though, failed to get a shot off as guard Milan Bojanic was stripped of the ball in the lane and Scott Karlis split a pair of free throws with :00.8 left to finish the scoring.

Bojanic thought he got fouled on the play but would not use that as an excuse for the Mustangs’ second straight loss.

“We don’t like to blame it on the refs,” Bojanic said. “We played bad. That’s why we lost. It was a tough loss. They’re a good team but we should have played better and won.”

The Mustangs played well enough to win, shooting 13-for-24 from the floor in the second half, including a 7-for-10 effort in the third quarter, during which the visitors were outscored 16-15.

Lake Park, normally an inconsistent outside shooting team, was deadly from the three-point arc, sinking nine treys, three each from Spencer, Nick Zanghi and Dave Prentis. Zanghi finished with 17 points, while Prentis tallied all 11 of his in the second half.

“When you get me, Dom and Dave Prentis on a roll together, we’re one of the best teams in the state, I think,” said Zanghi, who missed the first half of the season with a broken hand.

Obendorf poured in 23 points, including five three-pointers, while Ryan Solomon added 12 points for the Mustangs, who trailed by as many as nine points in the third quarter.

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