BG, Stevenson net tourney wins
Buffalo Grove hatched a plan and executed it to perfection Monday night.
Elgin did little to thwart it.
The Bison wanted to run with the speedy, experienced boys basketball team from Elgin when possible, fight for rebounding position against their taller opponents and force them to shoot low-percentage outside shots.
Check, check and check.
Buffalo Grove out-rebounded visiting Elgin 32-19, met little opposition when penetrating the lane in transition and forced the Maroons to settle for more jumpers than drives in a 71-59, season-opening victory at the Bison Thanksgiving Tournament, ruining the debut of new Elgin coach Mike Sitter.
The Bison ballooned their 39-35 halftime lead to a 15-point advantage by bursting out of the locker room on a 14-3 run that defined the game.
Senior Brian DeSimone canned an open 3-pointer from the top of the arc to start the spurt, drove the lane on a fast break to keep it going, and capped it with another open look from 3-point range. The last of those shots gave the Bison a 51-38 lead with 3:41 left in the quarter.
"We wanted to get them down as soon as we could to start the half," said DeSimone, who led all scorers with 23 points. "We wanted to come out right away, make some shots and stop them on defense."
Mike Ricciardi put Buffalo Grove ahead 53-48 seconds later after DeSimone fed him in the paint for an uncontested bucket, one of many looks that came too easy in Elgin's opinion.
"We just didn't get the job done defensively," said Sitter. "We can get so much better defensively. It takes all of our practice time, yet after the first five minutes it didn't show.
"We get tired, we stop communicating, we stop helping out our teammates. We have guys going coast to coast on us, and that just can't continue. I'll keep going down to the end of the bench until I find five guys who are going to stop dribble penetration."
Despite a starting lineup that featured one player taller than 6-foot-1 in Ricciardi, the Bison routinely gained second shots. In the second quarter alone Buffalo Grove scored baskets on its fifth and third shots of respective possessions.
"We had good positioning, and our guys just worked together," Bison coach Ryan O'Connor said. "We knew one thing they'd try to do was pound the boards against us, so it would be silly not to with our lack of size. We made it a point of emphasis in practice this week and we executed that pretty well."
Elgin trimmed a 14-point deficit to 8 points when junior Tom Roth sank a 3-pointer with 1:02 left in the game, but the Maroons' 20 turnovers, poor free-throw shooting (14 of 25) and 46 percent shooting from the field (21 of 46) kept any comeback from materializing.
"I thought we were ready, but our minds weren't focused on the game at all," said senior Armani Williams. "I saw it. Everybody saw it. Our minds just weren't there."
Stevenson 68, Holy Trinity 36: The Patriots coasted in their season opener with a 68-36 victory over at the Buffalo Grove Bison Thanksgiving Tournament,
Stevenson held the Tigers to 6 points in the first quarter and 7 points in the second. Meanwhile, the Pats had a field day offensively, scoring 26 points in the second quarter alone to take a 43-13 halftime lead.
"We were able to get ahead of them and do what we wanted," Stevenson coach Pat Ambrose said. "We didn't rebound as well as I would have hoped. But today was good for us to get that first one under out belts and get the nerves out.
The Patriots were paced by 6-foot-6 senior forward Henry Wood (15 points), 6-6 senior center Daniel Rebnord (11) and sophomore guard Jeffrey Levitt (11 points).
"We had a size advantage, so we took advantage of it," Ambrose said. "We really got after it on the offensive boards, especially Henry. He really got after it."
Stevenson (1-0) will play Elgin (0-1) at 7:30 p.m. today.
-- Jerry Fitzpatrick