Wheaton Academy claims share of league title
Before the season Wheaton Academy’s boys basketball team saw a prediction that Aurora Central Catholic would win the Suburban Christian Conference Blue Division.
“They didn’t take too kindly to that,” said coach Paul Ferguson of his Warriors.
On Friday they didn’t treat Aurora Central kindly, either. Wheaton Academy forced 21 turnovers on the Chargers’ home court to win 63-38 and clinch at least a share of its third straight conference title.
“Our guys were extremely excited about clinching, and the Blue Division was a very tough and rugged conference this year,” said Ferguson, whose last two titles came in the SCC Gold.
Wheaton Academy (15-8, 8-1) finishes conference play Feb. 24 at Marmion. Second-place St. Francis, which beat Marian Central 61-42 to improve to 6-2 in the Blue, ends with Aurora Christian and Aurora Central (7-15, 2-6).
“We wanted to really play under control,” said Wheaton Academy’s Cameron Harvey, who scored a game-high 21 points. “We knew we were going into a hostile environment, so we really wanted to play within ourselves. We didn’t want them to rattle us.”
Aurora Central had its man in the middle, Robert DeMyers, who led the Chargers with 12 points and 6 rebounds. It lacked three-year starting guard Joey McEachern, who took 17 stitches after last Saturday’s collision with Aurora Christian’s Jake Hanson. That affected the Chargers’ scoring and ball control.
“We had way too many turnovers at the end of the first half and going into the second half,” DeMyers said.
Aurora Christian squandered a 12-6 first-quarter lead, then after closing within 23-20 early in the second quarter committed 4 turnovers and missed three shots to allow Wheaton Academy a 34-24 halftime lead.
“They came out trapping and we didn’t do a very good job of stepping through the traps,” said Chargers coach Nathan Drye. “We just weren’t strong with the ball, and that led to turnovers and easy baskets.”
The third quarter was similar but more deadly since the Warriors made four of their first five 3-point shots, 3 straight by Collin Roy, who scored 12 points.
That produced a 15-0 run, which had Wheaton Academy up 52-30 after three quarters.
“We definitely wanted to pressure the ball tonight, get in their guards’ grills and take the ball away and force some turnovers tonight,” said Wheaton Academy’s Drew Sandberg, who had 3 steals and 4 points.
Lars Olson scored 8 points and Gordon Behr 6 for the Warriors; Matt Czerak scored 8 for ACC.