St. Francis holds off Fenton
Fenton had nearly come all the way back in Friday's boys basketball game at Glenbard West when St. Francis' Brian McMahon hurt the Bison once again.
From what was once a 15-point first-half deficit the Bison had recovered to pull within 4 with five minutes to play.
McMahon drew attention up top, then rifled a pass to Bob Vonderhaar on the low block for an easy lay-in.
It typified the play of the versatile senior forward, who with guard Dan McCoy led St. Francis to a 49-43 win for third place at the sixth annual Glenbard West Holiday Classic.
"Brian's an all-around player," said Spartans coach Shawn Healy. "He leads our team in points, assists and rebounds. That pretty much says it all."
McMahon scored 14 points with 22 rebounds -- equaling Fenton's total on the boards -- and McCoy had 20 points and hit four 3-pointers.
Over a zone defense, two of McCoy's 3s helped St. Francis (8-4) leap to a 19-7 lead after a quarter.
"Dan, he makes all his 3s, so that helps us a lot," said McMahon, who joined McCoy and Fenton's Gozie Umeadi and Damian Sieradzki as all-tourney picks.
"He was on fire tonight, so that forced them to spread out and that gave us open looks down low, too."
Fenton (5-8), committing a miniscule 2 turnovers in the game, rallied behind the two-man gang of Umeadi and Sieradzki, who scored a respective 23 and 10 points, plus 5 key late points by Billy Gratzl.
Forcing St. Francis into 1-of-8 shooting in the third quarter, the Bison steadily gained ground to draw close several times.
St. Francis' half-court patience, and Fenton's own misses near the hoop, never let the Bison all the way back.
"They're a very well-coached, disciplined team," said Umeadi, dogged by St. Francis' Ryan Ferguson in the second half. "You can tell from their screen-setting to the way they wait for screens. Every last aspect of their offense is phenomenal."
Umeadi's only 3-pointer had the Bison within 46-42 with 40 seconds to play. McCoy pushed it to 48-42 with 2 free throws. Umeadi's free throw with 14.7 seconds left was as close as Fenton got.
"We've been good enough to lose the close ones," said Fenton coach Dennis Cromer. "That's kind of where we're at, at this point."