Moran's 33 lead Jacobs

The Jacobs Golden Eagles climbed on the back of John Moran in the second half, after being outplayed by the Crystal Lake Central Tigers in the first half, and flew away with an 80-62 victory Saturday in Algonquin.

The Eagles were trailing CLC 39-30 at halftime, but Moran rattled off 22 of his career-high 33 points in the second half to lift Jacobs past the Tigers in the Fox Valley Conference crossover match-up.

The Eagles (13-1) seemed to bite off more than they could chew in the second quarter after CLC's Carson Sterchi and Josh Polk combined for 22 points. Moran was able to find teammate Eric Schmidt for a wide-open jumper from the corner to cut the deficit to 9-points as time ran out in the first half.

"We talked a little bit about the guys' responsibilities (at halftime). Zack (Peterson) took over (guarding) Sterchi in the second half and Conrad (Krutwig) stepped up his defense in the second half." said Jacobs coach Jim Hinkle. "Those two guys really keyed the turnaround. Johnny then went on a roll offensively."

The Eagles forced 10 third quarter Tiger (7-7) turnovers and outscored their opponent 24-8. Polk (18 points) and Sterchi (17 points) were held to 7 points combined in the second half on only 2 field goals.

Moran took over the game in the second half and added 11 assists and 6 steals. He started the quarter finding Krutwig for an easy basket, and then started knocking down shot after shot including 4 second half 3-pointers after only hitting 1 in the first half.

"We knew we were only down nine and we played pretty bad, so we knew if we played our regular game and came out we knew we would be able to come back," said Moran. "I wasn't hitting (shots) in the first half, but I knew I had to make some shots to come back. I just had a lot of open looks and we kept running the same play."

Krutwig added 16 points and Peterson chimed in with 13 points for Jacobs.