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Burlington Central routs Johnsburg

As the Burlington Central boys basketball team filed out of the locker room after Friday's nights disappointing loss to Marengo, judging by each member's body language. you had to feel bad for whomever was next on the list for the Rockets.

Tuesday night in Johnsburg, the Skyhawks discovered right from the opening tap they were in the wrong place at the wrong time and the Rockets were all business.

On a designed play, Joey Ratzek tapped the ball forward to Zach Schutta who found Mike Kalusa streaking wide open for a layup just 3 seconds in and that was just the beginning of a 71-37 drubbing of the Skyhawks in Kishwaukee River action.

The Rockets (17-2, 3-1) cast their frustrations out on the defensive end forcing Johnsburg (10-11, 3-2) into 26 turnovers which lit a spark into a Central offense that shot 35.4 percent against Marengo. The Rockets scorched the nets with a 62 percent clip from the field, scoring 40 of their points in the paint mainly from 17 layups while 12 players found their way into the scoring column, including Ratzek, Schutta and Emmanuel Wells, who scored at least 10 points each.

"We took the loss to Marengo very personal," said Kalusa, who finished with 9 points and 5 steals. "We pride ourselves on defense and (coach Brett Porto) came into practice this week with a defensive mind. We did mostly defensive drills and worked on our press and that helped us and our defensive created offense for us and that's what helps us win basketball games."

Wells led all scorers with 11 points to go with 2 steals as BC jumped out to leads of 15-3 and 18-5 in the first quarter thanks to a suffocating defense while Schutta (10 points) had the highlight of the night stealing an inbounds pass and cocked back a thunderous, two-handed slam for a 26-12 lead with 6:15 left in the second quarter.

"At that point we knew the momentum shifted and they were out of the game and they couldn't play with us. It was mesmerizing," Kalusa said of Schutta's dunk. "He can get up. I love playing with Schutta."

Johnsburg had just 20 points at the half and committed 14 turnovers. And sticking with a defensive theme, Skyhawks guard Zach Toussaint, who scored 27 of his 34 points against Woodstock Friday in the second half alone, was held scoreless on 0-for-5 shooting thanks to the work of Wells and the Central help defense.

"He's a good player and we've seen him, we've been scouting him," Wells said. "I wanted to keep him in front and not let him get by me and with my teammates helping me on help side it was easy,"

Johnsburg struggled shooting 29.1 percent in the first half and finished with a 31.1 percent clip on 14 of 45 shooting as Jackson LaMarche led the team with 9 points. Central totaled 18 steals, as Ta Vontae Harris had 5 points and 5 steals and the bench contributed 26 points as the Rockets corrected what they saw on film over the weekend.

"They were concerned just watching the film and seeing the easy things that were very correctable that made them go, 'gosh, we did all those things incorrect and we still only lost by four. What type of team can we be if we fix those corrections?' " Porto said. "And that's kind of the mindset we're taking into the last month and a half is trying to make those little corrections that can help us go a long way."

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