Boys Basketball: South Elgin hits its threes, defeats Bartlett

Updated: January 11, 2012 10:15PM

South Elgin’s shooters have discovered a little confidence can go a long way.

The Storm struggled throughout the first half of the season just to get into the high 30s in scoring, but Wednesday night South Elgin followed up Saturday’s 56-30 win over East Aurora by shooting lights out over the final three quarters to pull away from rival Bartlett in a homecourt 51-39 Upstate Eight Valley victory.

“It’s nice when they fall,” said South Elgin’s Eric Stazy, who hit three three-pointers and scored 13 points, all in the final three quarters. “When our three-point shots fall, we can be pretty dangerous. We’ve got a lot of guys who can shoot the ball.”

Certainly Stazy and Darius Wells could shoot it against Bartlett. Wells finished with a game-high 19 points, including a three three-pointers. The two scored 19 of Bartlett’s 30 points in the second and third quarters, and point guard Jake Maestranzi had a three-pointer, as well, to help break open the contest.

“They’re shooting the ball with confidence,” South Elgin coach Chaz Taft said. “That’s what we’ve been saying all year is we’ve got to shoot the ball. I mean, come on guys, we’ve been working at it and working at it and eventually it’s going to click.

“Everybody was saying that we’ve been stalling, but we weren’t — we just couldn’t get a shot off. But now we’re used to guys coming at us in practice and stuff like that, so they’re getting a little more comfortable.”

The Storm shot 15-of-25 from the field over the final three quarters (60 percent) after missing 8-of-10 the first quarter, and went on to pass 50 points in consecutive games for the first time this season. Wells and Stazy had missed three three-pointers each in the first quarter, but were undeterred. They went 5-of-7 from beyond the arc the rest of the game.

“Shooters keep shooting,” Wells said. “We had open shots. We have to take them.”

The Storm (9-8, 2-5) went ahead for good on Ryne Lundy’s hook shot 2-1/2 minutes into the second quarter for a 9-7 lead, but it was a close game at 16-15 before Maestranzi sank a three-pointer 10 seconds before halftime. When Kris Fojas made a layup and Stazy a three-pointer and 15-footer off Maestranzi’s assist coming out of the locker room, the Storm’s run hit 10-0 for a 26-14 lead.

The Hawks whittled it down to 34-28 on a layup by Matt Chaltin (team-high 10 points) 20 seconds into the fourth quarter, but a pair of three-pointers by Wells made it 43-30 and Bartlett never got closer than 10 again.

“They did a great job of hitting their shots in key spots and we didn’t,” Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith said. “End of story. They did a good job of running their stuff and getting good looks.”

The Hawks (7-8, 1-5) shot just 26 percent from the floor the first three quarters (8-of-31) before making 5-of-9 in the fourth quarter when Chaltin had six points by posting up low.

“I felt we got frustrated by their physicality at our offensive end and then we let it carry over to the other end,” Wolfsmith said.

Maestranzi finished with seven points and four assists and earned some praise for setting up the open shots.

“The key was Maestranzi,” Taft said. “He makes a lot of things happen with his dribble penetration and he gets us settled down. He gets us into things.”

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