Boys Basketball: Highland Park survives slow start

Updated: December 27, 2011 7:28PM

Things weren’t looking very good for Highland Park late in the third quarter of its game with Lake Forest at Tuesday’s inaugural Hinsdale South Holiday Tournament.

The Giants were struggling to find the basket and were easily getting outrebounded by the Scouts, who led 23-13 with less than a minute left in the third period.

But Highland Park finally got things going and outscored Lake Forest 19-8 during the last nine minutes and that helped it to rally for a 32-29 victory in Darien.

With the win over their North Shore neighbors, the Giants (6-4) advance to Wednesday’s 3 p.m. quarterfinals against Brother Rice (7-3), who beat Nazareth 74-58.

“When you’re getting good looks and can’t knock down the shots, it’s frustrating,” Giants coach Paul Harris said. “Our defense kept us in the game in the first half and it led to offense for us in the second half. Hopefully beating a team like Lake Forest will do a lot for our confidence.”

Highland Park scored the final five points of the third quarter after Jake Norcia (13 points) hit a three-pointer and Ross Chukerman (six points) added two free throws.

After Lake Forest (3-6) got a layup from Carter Bass (seven points) early in the final period, the Giants scored the next eight points to grab a 26-25 advantage.

Josh Sterns (nine points) made consecutive three-pointers and Norcia converted two free throws to cap the 8-0 spurt for Highland Park, which was outrebounded 34-12.

“We were getting good shots and some times they don’t fall,” Sterns said. “But that’s why we focus on defense and our defense kept us in the game. So when shots don’t fall, we know that we’re going to keep ourselves in the game because we’re a good defensive team.”

Evan Boudreaux (11 points, 12 rebounds) hit a jumper with 4:16 left to put the Scouts up 27-26 but the Giants responded with a 6-0 run to move back in front.

Lake Forest, which meets Nazareth at 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday in consolation play, also got seven points from Thomas Durrett and nine rebounds from John Hayes.

“We missed a lot of bunnies following rebounds,” Scouts coach Phil LaScala said. “Highland Park did a good job defensively and forced some turnovers and then capitalized on the other end. You have to give them a lot of credit since they battled hard and didn’t give up.” 

© 2012 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.