Hersey's Compton reaps rewards of his hard work

There may not be a more unlikely starter still playing in any class of the boys basketball state tournament than Mike Compton.

The 5-foot-9 senior didn't even make the Hersey team last year. Compton spent most of this regular season playing in junior varsity games and scored 5 varsity points.

Then the state tournament rolled around and Hersey coach Steve Messer made Compton a starter. It's a role he'll fill again at 7:30 p.m. today in the Class 4A sectional championship against Evanston on its home floor.

"He gives us a very positive spark," Messer said. "It's fun to see a kid who could have easily said it's not worth it keep battling away and never complaining."

Messer has no complaints with the stability Compton has provided the Huskies. He's not in there to match leading scorers Luke Fabrizius and Griffin Dwyer, but he did hit his first 3-pointer in Wednesday night's semifinal win over Maine East.

"He's very quick and aggressive," Messer said. "He plays without fear."

Messer and assistant coach Chad Freeman wondered if they might have made a mistake by not playing Compton more earlier.

But they looked back and said it was a matter of time and development with the JV and as the top scout team player that prepared Compton for his sudden role reversal.

"He kept getting better and better and now he's a pretty clear starter," Messer said. "He just kept developing and he put himself there."

Over-stated: Former Schaumburg basketball assistant Tom Mueller mentioned before Wednesday's game that sometimes it's best to let struggling stars suffer in silence.

Schaumburg's Cully Payne had missed 9 of his first 10 shots from the field when he missed a free throw with 5:54 left in the Barrington 4A sectional semifinal.

The Highland Park student section erupted with a chorus of "Over-rated, over-rated."

How did Payne respond?

With Schaumburg's lead cut to 5, Payne saw an opening in the lane and sped down the left side for a layup.

On the next possession, Payne hit a pull-up 3 with a defender in his face for a 48-40 lead.

Then he made a perfect bounce pass from nearly 20 feet away from the basket to a cutting Blake Mueller for a layup. Payne added one more slick hesitation drive in the final minute that had sounds of silence from the Giants' supporters.

"When they do that it makes me more fired up," Payne said. "As soon as they do that, I'm like, 'OK.' "

More Knights' time: Seniors Jeff Heiden and Alex Toth finished their Prospect careers impressively with 24 and 20 points, respectively, in a 63-56 4A regional final loss to Evanston.

"For the two of them to go out the way they did, it was good," said Prospect coach John Camardella after his first team finished 17-11. "I told the kids, and it was a pretty emotional locker room, in order to have confidence in these games you've got to be there once. You start appreciating the type of work you need to do."

Camardella has some good components to work with next year, with 6-6 Kevin Reed and guard Jason Leblebijian back as starters. Sophomore Joe LaTulip got better as the season went on and will be joined by some tall and talented classmates off a 21-2 season.

"We should be pretty athletic and they can all handle the ball pretty well," Camardella said. "I'm so used to working with offensive-minded players and these kids 'D' it up hard. It's going to be fun to see them next year."

A familiar debut: It would be tough to top Dave Brown's debut season as a head coach in 1990-91 when Rolling Meadows went 28-3 and reached the AA Elite Eight.

But Brown's son D.J. is making a similar run with a Tinley Park program not known for success in the South suburbs.

D.J. Brown doesn't have Mike Lipnisky as his dad had to start with.

But Brown, who seven years ago was an All-Area guard playing for his dad in a AA sectional final loss to eventual state champion Schaumburg, has a team that has won 16 of 21 games. Tinley Park plays in its first sectional final tonight in 3A against Thornton Fractional North.

"Coach Brown taught us how to believe in ourselves," Tinley Park junior Roosevelt Green told the Southtown Star after a 74-64 win over Seton Academy on Tuesday. "We practice hard. We work hard. We play hard. We were tired of losing. We had to stop the losing.

"Coach Brown told us that if we worked hard and listened to him it would pay off."

Tinley Park (19-12) had not won 10 games combined the last two seasons before Brown took over. A win tonight would put a program with regional titles in 1989 and 1991 into a potential supersectional matchup against two-time reigning AA champion Simeon.

Tip-ins: Schaumburg junior Blake Mueller's 22 points Wednesday eclipsed his previous two-year varsity bests of 13 this season against Fremd and Glenbrook South … Hersey junior Kyle Mengarelli's 17 points Wednesday surpassed his previous bests of 13 against York and Buffalo Grove … Also interesting in tonight's Barrington sectional final will be the battle of two impressive student sections from Zion-Benton and Schaumburg … Zion-Benton fans are wearing T-shirts with "It's Our Time" on the front. On the back are boxes with conference and regional champions that are checked and boxes for sectional and state champions still open … The Mid-Suburban League has two teams in the final 16 -- albeit in 4A -- for the first time since 1990 when Meadows beat Hersey and Conant lost to West Aurora in AA supersectionals.