Eagles' shooting flies south in semifinals
It all started to snowball for Aurora Christian -- one missed shot after another, and another, and another.
To make things even more difficult, the Chargers were playing against the hottest team in the 16-team Plano Christmas Classic.
It all led to a surprising meltdown Friday night in the semifinals, as No. 1 seed Spring Valley Hall waltzed past No. 4 Aurora Christian 65-39, sending the Eagles to the third-place game.
Aurora Christian (7-5) will face No. 2 Genoa-Kingston tonight at 6:30 while Hall (13-1) will play for the tournament title against three-time champion Seneca at 8 p.m.
Against a team as solid all-around as Hall, Aurora Christian's could ill afford to struggle offensively. But that's exactly what the Eagles did -- mightily -- shooting just 26 percent from the field (14 for 53).
"We missed a couple early and then kind of lost our composure," Aurora Christian coach Don Davidson said. "Then all of a sudden we started shooting anything that looked like a shot. We panicked and just started shooting, and that's when things really began to snowball."
Meanwhile, Hall used it potent combination of size -- with the 6-5 trio of Clayton Cissell, Ryan Nett and Steffen Marroquin -- along with its feisty backcourt of slashing guards to exploit the Eagles' offensive woes.
An 8-2 run to close the first quarter put Hall up 17-9, and Christian went into the deep freeze shortly thereafter. Travis Cleveland (9 points, 9 rebounds) scored a quick basket underneath to open the quarter, but that would be the Eagles' only field goal of the frame until Marcus Barnes (7 points) hit Aurora Christian's first 3-pointer with :15 left before halftime.
In between, Hall racked up 12 consecutive points en route to a 31-16 halftime lead.
While AC clunked, Hall clicked. The Red Devils were led by Cissell with 13 points (on 6 of 8 shooting) while guard Korby Kasperski added 12 and Nett nine points.
"We don't have one, great player; but we've got 4-5 really good ones," Hall coach Mike Filippini said. "It's tough to defend a team like us because you can't key on just one guy."
Aurora Christian's lone spurt came midway through the third quarter, and it was brief. Jordan Roberts (3 points) hit a 3-pointer, and Joe Redmond (9 points) and Barnes (7 points) followed in succession to spark an 11-3 run that closed the gap to 39-27. But just as quickly, Hall restored its advantage to 15, leading 46-31 entering the fourth quarter.
"For as bad as we were shooting, we were able to cut into the lead and I thought we could do a few things from there," Davidson said.
But more missed shots led to more rebounds and "that became a disaster because as big as they (Hall) are, they owned the boards and you can see how things fall apart," Davidson said.
Hall owned a modest 36-28 edge on the boards but held similar control in all facets of the game.
"That was the best overall game we've played," Filippini said. "We're not real fancy on offense; we run 3-4 different things. But we run them all pretty well. I don't think we're (26) points better than Aurora Christian. We just caught them on an off night and executed our gameplan perfectly."
The championship game will be a rematch of a Thanksgiving meeting between Hall and Seneca, a 45-38 Hall victory.
Aurora Christian will be taking on Genoa-Kingston with what Davidson hopes is a revitalized attitude.
"Unselfishness and toughness," Davidson said. "We've been preaching it all year. My son (Trinity coach Marc Davidson) talked to them about it last week too. We could have used some in this game."