WW South downs Kaneland, wins tourney title

Wheaton Warrenville South's boys basketball team turned energy into efficiency at both ends of the court Friday night.

Senior guard Matt Dacy-Seijo drained three of his four 3-pointers in the third quarter while teammate Ryan Scudder knocked down another 3-point basket from the top of the key to ignite a 17-0 run over the final 5:08 of the period during the Tigers' 61-36 triumph over Kaneland (3-1) in Batavia.

The win, coupled with Batavia's 73-68 overtime victory over St. Francis, assured the Tigers (3-0) of the tournament title at the 40th annual Ken Peddy Windmill City Classic.

Wheaton Warrenville South wraps up tournament action Saturday against St. Francis (1-2).

"The kids really played hard," said Tigers coach Mike Healy. "I thought our offense was dictated by how hard we played defensively. We didn't give them many good looks."

Both teams entered the game with unbeaten records.

"Kaneland is talented," said Healy. "They've got the four shooters. Our focus was making sure they didn't get many catch and shoot threes. I felt we executed the game plan really well."

The Tigers quickly stretched their 24-17 halftime lead to 13 at 33-20 during the opening minutes of the third quarter as Dacy-Seijo drained a pair of 3-pointers and assisted on teammate Eric Rasch's 3-point play.

After the Knights' Jake Gomes (8 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists) converted his own miss to cut the deficit to 33-22, Scudder (6 points, 6 rebounds, 2 steals) connected on a long 3-pointer, Dacy-Seijo followed with a 3-point basket from the corner, and Jeran Simpson hit a 3-pointer to extend the Tigers' lead to 42-22.

Wheaton Warrenville South led 50-22 after 3 quarters.

"I think it was our effort," Dacy-Seijo said of his team's pressure defense that helped force 20 turnovers. "It was at the highest point it could be. It started in practice today. I feel like we went hard from the first points to the end.

"That's a talented team," Dacy-Seijo said of Kaneland. "We all brought it to the table today."

Simpson paced the Tigers with 17 points while Dacy-Seijo and Rasch added 12 points apiece.

"My teammates set me up really well," said Dacy-Seijo. "It was a lot of fun."

Kaneland, which fell behind 8-0 in the first 3 minutes, struggled in all phases of the game, shooting just 29 percent (12 of 41) from the field and 52 percent (11 of 21) at the free-throw line.

"Maybe the first few games didn't offer us a big enough challenge to really understand what we need to do to be successful," said Knights coach Joe Conroy. "That's nothing against those teams. You can't live and die shooting from the outside. We have to get the ball inside."

Mark Lilly scored 7 points for the Knights while Ryan David and Dylan Vaca added 6 points apiece.

"I knew their coach was going to have his team really ready to go," said Conroy. "We tried to talk about it. We tried to walk through it today. Obviously, we have some things to figure out.

"We didn't move the ball fast enough and guys didn't move fast enough to get open."