Quick start lifts Conant over Naperville North

Naperville North's boys basketball team heads into a brief Christmas break fresh off one of its best halves of the season.

But the Huskies do not head into the holiday break fresh off a victory. That's because Saturday afternoon's solid play against visiting Conant was not enough to overcome a sluggish first half in which the Cougars (7-3) stormed out for 23 points in the first quarter on their way to a 36-19 lead at the half.

Naperville North used a tough trapping defense and some strong offense from seniors Tom Walsh and Austin Weiss to make things tight in the second half, but eventually fell 59-45 in a rare Saturday afternoon boys basketball tilt.

"We were very disappointed in the way we came out," said Huskies coach Mark Lindo, whose team fell to Wheaton North Friday night. "Our focus and our energy before the basketball game lacked quite a bit."

Conant wasted little time in taking advantage of the slow start by the Huskies (3-8). Tom Sotos opened the game with a pair of quick 3-pointers and added two more before the quarter ended. Add to that a couple of free throws and the Cougar sharpshooter tallied 14 points in the first quarter alone as his team led 23-9 after eight minutes of play.

"We worked extremely hard on our offense the other day in practice," explained Sotos, who finished with 19 points. "We wanted to hit our screens and get open shots. We came out today and executed our offense."

But just as Weiss and Walsh started to heat up in the second half, the Cougars started to turn the ball over against a fired-up Naperville North defense. Weiss and Walsh each scored 9 points in the second half and each finished with 15 points for the game.

The hosts closed the gap somewhat to 43-34 by outscoring Conant 15-7 in the third quarter when the Cougars had 9 turnovers. The Huskies then got to within 47-43 with 4:26 left to play as Walsh scored 5 straight points to cap a 9-0 run.

But the Cougars managed to regroup from there and close out the game with a 12-2 finish that featured a steal and 2 free throws from Sotos, a layup from Chris Hoffman (team-high 13 rebounds) and a pair of free throws by Tony Rizzo.

"We were really happy with the way we started the game, but we felt we ended up the game with too many turnovers," Conant coach Tom McCormack said. "But you have to give some credit to Naperville North. They started to trap us a little and that gave us some problems."

Lindo is hopeful his team can enjoy the holiday, overcome a recent tough stretch that included games with the likes of Wheaton North, West Aurora and Conant, and pick up some victories next week at Waubonsie's Christmas tourney. "Hopefully we can have our guys enjoy Christmas with their families, then come out at Waubonsie and not (just) play well, but get some wins," he said.