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Boys Basketball: St Charles East hands Elgin second loss in a row
Updated: February 3, 2012 11:34PM
Elgin is finding the road a bit more difficult the second time through the Upstate Eight River schedule.
St. Charles East took its turn getting payback against the Maroons on Friday, burying nine three-pointers and coming a way with a 65-63 upset that sent visiting Elgin to its second loss in a row.
Kendall Stephens drained four three-pointers and finished with 21 points for the Saints, but his teammates did the heavy lifting down the stretch after the Purdue-bound guard fouled out with 4:28 remaining.
Sophomore Dominic Adduci (14 points), sophomore Dave Mason (11 points) and senior Johnny Hondlik (10 points) also scored in double figures for St. Charles East (12-8, 7-3), which won its fourth in a row and avenged a 55-39 loss to the Maroons in December.
“The best time to be playing well is in the conference race going into the regional,” St. Charles East coach Patrick Woods said. “I wouldn’t want it any other way. It’s better than peaking too early.
“The amazing thing is I still think we can get better. This was obviously one of our best games this year, but hopefully we have more to come.”
Kory Brown tallied 27 points and 13 rebounds for Elgin (16-3, 5-3), with nine of those points coming in the first quarter as the Maroons bolted to a 14-4 lead.
The second quarter was an entirely different story as the Saints scored the first 18 points and held Elgin without a field goal until Gerardo Mojica’s bucket with 1:36 left in the half. St. Charles East eventually went to the locker room with a 27-21 advantage and a major wave of momentum.
“We got off to a slow start offensively, but we definitely picked it up, got in a rhythm and got the jitters out I guess you could say,” Stephens said. “Shots started to fall and we started to feed off each other.”
The Maroons pulled within 34-32 midway through the third quarter, but the Saints answered with nine straight points highlighted by a pair of three-pointers from Adduci.
St. Charles East’s lead was 59-50 with 1:22 left, but three-pointers from Brown and Matt Andres helped Elgin cut the deficit to 64-61 with 13 seconds remaining. There were some tense moments for the Saints when Adduci missed the first of two free throws with eight seconds left, but he swished the second, making Ryan Sitter’s basket at the buzzer for the Maroons a moot point.
“We took our foot off their throat,” Elgin coach Mike Sitter said. “Our kids admitted at halftime that they didn’t come out in the second quarter with the same intensity. This is varsity basketball against a good conference team, and we deserve the loss for doing that.”
The outcome tightens the race in the UEC River as Elgin, St. Charles East and Geneva are all tied for second behind St. Charles North, which beat Geneva on Friday. The Saints host the North Stars on Wednesday.
The Maroons got 11 points from Arie Williams and 10 points from Mojica, who hobbled off with 3:06 left in the fourth after spraining his right ankle for the third time this season. Elgin finished 10-for-18 from the free-throw line and 22-for-54 (40.7 percent) from the field.
“We’ve been on a little downturn lately with our shooting,” Brown said. “We’ve just got to pick it back up.”
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