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Boys Basketball: Dundee-Crown holds off Johnsburg
Updated: January 4, 2012 10:54PM
The rustiness coach Lance Huber feared from his Dundee-Crown Chargers after a long layoff since before Christmas never materialized in Wednesday’s nonconference home game against Johnsburg.
Instead, another problem — contentment — creeped in and nearly disrupted Dundee-Crown before the Chargers pulled away in the closing minutes behind Brandon Rodriguez and Dylan Kissack for a 59-46 victory.
“I thought we were OK in the first half, I thought we had a really nice third quarter, and then it was almost like we took it for granted,” Huber said.
Dundee-Crown (7-6) owned a 46-26 lead with a few seconds left in the third quarter and then Johnsburg went on a tear, triggered by five D-C turnovers to start the fourth quarter. The Skyhawks (4-8) scored 15 straight points and got within 46-41 before Huber called timeout.
After the timeout, Kyle Bernhard sank a layup off an assist from Will Stupar, Kissack sank a layup off an assist from Rodriguez and Kissack sank a three-pointer with 1:50 to play for a 53-41 lead.
“They went to the trap, and we just lost our composure a little bit,” Rodriguez said. “After coach called timeout and talked to us, we got back our composure and stuck it out and just got strong with the ball.”
Even then it wasn’t cinched because Johnsburg’s Kevin Dombrowski scored five quick points and cut the deficit to 53-46. But Kissack made two free throws and a layup and Rodriguez two free throws to ice it.
Rodriguez had 17 points and Kissack matched a career high with 21. It was Rodriguez, though, who did the most offensively to stake the Chargers to their big early lead. He scored seven of their 18 points in the first quarter en route to an 18-9 lead, then had eight more over the next two quarters when they widened the edge to 46-28.
“I thought Brandon really set the tempo early,” Huber said about his 6-foot junior. “I thought he did a great job. He’s very talented and we ask him to do a lot.
“He is doing more and more. We’d really like to see him rebound more. I think he can. He’s just got to want to sometimes.”
Rodriguez finished with 10 rebounds and four assists, two steals and a blocked shot.
“They were playing zone against us at first,” Rodriguez said. “That obviously shows if they were playing zone that they can’t guard us in man to man, so we wanted to get it in the paint. And we were being real aggressive on the boards, too.”
Kissack’s 21 included three of the Chargers’ six three-pointers. The Chargers, who made 56 percent from the field (23-of-41) also had 10 points from Stupar. D-C outrebounded Johnsburg 30-23 but was hurt by 19 turnovers in the game.
Johnsburg, which shot 36 percent from the floor (18-of-50) got 17 points from T.J. Sigmund.
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