Stevenson's decisive win frosts Warren

A huge sheet cake with blue and yellow icing was delivered to the Warren boys basketball locker room late Friday night.

It was celebrating the 300th career victory of Warren head coach Chuck Ramsey, who reached the milestone earlier this month and was presented with a plaque prior to the start of the Blue Devils' game against Stevenson.

All the Blue Devils were encouraged to take some cake on their way out.

The irony was that visiting Stevenson left the gym with something much sweeter.

The Patriots were on the verge of blowing out Warren in its own gym, up by 20 points heading into the fourth quarter. But they ended up settling for a 66-60 win after the Blue Devils came to life in the final minutes to finally make a game of it.

Still, there were smiles all around for the Patriots, who seemed like they were the ones riding a sugar high.

"This is my first win ever at Warren," beamed Stevenson guard Kevin Stineman, who scored a team-high 23 points and was finally playing comfortably. He began the season with a painful cyst on his knee, but recently received a cortisone shot to numb the pain. "Besides the (Sears Centre) supersectional last year, I personally have never been on a team that's beaten Warren. We lost twice to them freshman year, twice sophomore year, twice (during the regular season) last year. So this feels really good.

"Usually we're the ones who are down 20 going into the fourth quarter. It felt good that it was the other way around this time."

The victory moves Stevenson, which experienced a rare occurrence in the second quarter by hitting all of its field goals (8-for-8) and all of its free throws (3-for-3), to 5-2 overall and 2-1 in North Suburban Conference Lake Division play. Warren drops to 5-2 and 2-2 in the Lake.

"We played probably the best half that we've played this year, or maybe of our careers," said Stineman, who helped salt away the game by nailing 5-of-6 free throws in the fourth quarter. Teammate Dylan Richter was just as clutch, sinking 6-of-6 fourth quarter free throws as part of his 22-point night. "But we knew in the second half, Warren was going to come back. They're a solid team and they always find a way to get back into every game."

The Blue Devils, who were down 50-30 at the beginning of the fourth quarter, mounted their comeback by creating turnovers and making 3-pointers and free throws.

Stevenson, which had just 9 turnovers prior to the start of the fourth quarter, had 19 by the end of the game.

Meanwhile, Warren made good on 5 of 6 fourth quarter 3-pointers and 7 of 9 free throws.

Junior guards Brandon Paul and David Duncan did the most damage.

In the fourth quarter alone, Paul hit 2 three-pointers and 6 of 8 free throws en route to a game-high 26 points. And Duncan, a reserve, tallied 11 of his career-high 20 points.

"In the beginning of the game, they came out with a lot more intensity than we did," said Paul, who finished just shy of his career-high of 28 points, which was set over Thanksgiving against Bartlett. "They wanted it more, they played a lot tougher and they dominated us on the boards. We have to play a lot tougher inside.

"We came out in the second half with a chip on our shoulders, but apparently is wasn't enough. We should have played like that in the beginning."