Turnovers, St. Charles East defeat Metea Valley
A first-year boys varsity basketball team such as Metea Valley will endure rough patches.
Like the second quarter Saturday at St. Charles East.
The Saints forced 10 second-quarter turnovers and 23 for the game, leading by as many as 19 points before easing to a 55-45 Upstate Eight Conference crossover win.
The key was a switching defense against Metea's flex offense, said Saints guard Spencer Motley, who scored 11 points with 3 steals and contained Metea bomber Lashawn Cargo to 7 points and none in the first half.
“We call it ‘Jaws' we switch every screen,” Motley said. “It just threw them out of everything, and they really just didn't know what to do out of that, and just confused them.”
Indeed, “Jaws” proved horrific for Metea Valley (5-5). The Mustangs got down 8-2, rode a hot Kenny Obendorf to a 12-11 lead after a quarter then went nearly seven minutes without scoring as St. Charles East (3-6) went up 25-16 at halftime.
It shouldn't have been that way, Metea coach Bob Vozza said.
“Their switching on their defensive side, we've talked about it extensively, they know what to do,” he said. “At that point we just kind of panicked, didn't get things done.”
Obendorf scored a team-high 16 points, but another typical Metea double-digit scorer, Milan Bojanic, produced 5 points before fouling out with 39 seconds left.
Bojanic, too, seemed perplexed.
“We just need to run our plays,” he said. “If we just calmed down and ran our plays it would have been fine, but we were just in a hurry and we couldn't run anything.”
St. Charles East, which offered the home varsity debut of 6-foot-5 freshman David Mason, led 35-26 entering the fourth quarter.
The Saints bumped it to 45-26 with 5 minutes, 11 seconds to play, steals from Motley and Kendall Stephens creating points as well as Dan Ditusa's 3-pointer.
A Metea push keyed by a pair of Cargo 3s and Sean Davis' inside presence cut the deficit to 50-43 with 1:15 to play, but the Saints hit enough free throws savor a win.
“We should have shortened it up a little bit quicker than that, we shouldn't have let it get down (to 7),” said Stephens, who scored a game-high 19 points with 3 blocks and 2 steals. “But we're definitely learning how to win, and we're taking it day by day in practice.”
Though that second quarter was a tough stretch for Metea, St. Charles East coach Brian Clodi has seen worse. His Saints started 0-5.
“The kids are starting to come together, playing together and making good decisions,” he said. “We made enough plays obviously to have a 10-point win.”