Carmel circles the wagons, ambushes Vernon Hills

There are only five players pictured in the Carmel team photo that is part of the program for the Lake Zurich Martin Luther King Classic.

The Corsairs were missing five players, including three starters, who had been dismissed from the team a couple of weeks ago for disciplinary reasons.

With the late addition of a few underclassmen, Carmel was up to an eight-man rotation for Saturday's pool play game at Lake Zurich against Vernon Hills.

The Corsairs didn't let the short bench throw them, though.

They played with energy and hustle in running over Vernon Hills, 63-46. With a 2-2 record in the tournament thus far, Carmel (8-9 overall) sits in third place in its pool.

"We had to come out with energy and we did," said Carmel senior guard CJ Duff, who scored a game-high 21 points. "And we played defense. That and (Matt Stephens) got us off to a good start."

Stephens, a senior forward for the Corsairs, came out blazing. He knocked down 4 three-pointers in the first quarter, accounting for all 12 of his points.

"It's just practice, just working on game-speed shots in practice, shooting on our gun and just finishing," Stephens said.

Thanks to Stephens' shooting, Carmel stormed out to a 22-7 lead by the end of the first quarter.

"It was disappointing to give up so many points so early in the game like that," Vernon Hills coach Matt McCarty said. "I looked up and I think they had 17 points in the first four minutes of the game. They were on pace for 88, and we were on pace for 22."

Vernon Hills, normally a deadly 3-point shooting team, hit just 2-of-13 shots from downtown. In a game the day before, the Cougars were 0-for-14 from 3-point range.

No one finished in double-figures for Vernon Hills, which got a team-high 8 points out of both Jack O'Connell and Jay Holloway.

"I was disappointed in our intensity to start the game," McCarty said. "A lot of credit to them (Carmel). They were the team that came out with more energy.

"It's really disappointing for us not to be able to (capitalize off of Carmel's short bench)."

Carmel also got 9 points out of junior forward John Barr and 8 points out of sophomore guard Zion Kilpatrick, who started along with two freshmen, Johnny Roeser and Lukas Galdoni.

The Corsairs have played the last five games with the shortened roster and with younger players in more prominent roles.

"We're throwing those guys in there and they're learning," Carmel coach Zack Ryan said. "They are doing great, for the situation they're in. We've competed in practice and in games. We've just kind of run out of steam sometimes.

"But we have a guy like CJ (Duff), a senior leader who they can learn from. CJ and Matt (Stephens) are doing a great job of just handling the situation with those guys. It's been awesome."

Duff and Stephens say that the sudden transition of playing with newer, younger players hasn't been as painful as one would think.

"We're in a tough stretch right now," Duff said. "We just have to buckle down. Guys just need to step up. We've had three freshmen step up in Jalen (Snell), Lukas (Galdoni) and Johnny (Roeser). Right now, it's all about getting better each game. That's what coach keeps telling us."

"It's definitely a change and some big adversity," Stephens said. "It's a big mental game, too. Losing a bunch of our star guys and then having to take on new roles is difficult. But our guys have handled it well."