Upstate Eight shines bright in postseason
Neuqua Valley. Bartlett. Elgin.
"Three teams in the Sweet 16 from the Upstate Eight," Neuqua Valley coach Todd Sutton said Thursday.
"Looks like another down year for the conference."
The irony.
"We actually talked about that at our post-conference meeting," first-year Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith said before his Hawks beat Glenbard West 67-64 Tuesday in a Class 4A East Aurora sectional semifinal.
"As we were walking out Todd, (Waubonsie Valley coach) Steve (Weemer) and I and said, wouldn't it be great if we all meet at East Aurora on a common floor we all play at with all three of us in the sectional?"
Mission accomplished, though not quite as great for Weemer as for Wolfsmith and Sutton.
Sutton's No. 6 seeded Wildcats (24-7) defeated Waubonsie Valley, 56-51, making an appointment for today's 7:30 p.m. Class 4A East Aurora sectional final against No. 8 seed Bartlett (22-7). Neuqua aims to snap an 0-3 mark in these big games.
Neuqua Valley took an early loss to Waubonsie Valley then won five straight conference games to claim the UEC title when St. Charles East defeated the Warriors on the final night of the regular season. The Hawks' 7-3 record tied them for third place in conference and included a 66-61 loss to Neuqua Valley.
But even considering Bartlett's 86-63 win over No. 1 seed Batavia as an upset for the championship of Bartlett's own regional, this team is wildly talented.
"Bartlett is the most improved team in the state," Sutton said.
Six-foot-9 center Kamil Janton, who averages 11.9 points and is a Division I recruit bound for Eastern Michigan, is not the leading scorer on this team.
Nor is it senior 6-5 forward Cory Hrynyk, who averages 13.6 points a game and extends defenses with his 35 3-point baskets.
That would be super-soph Luke Labedzki, who has hit a team-high 48 3-pointers and leads Bartlett at 13.8 points a game. He scored a team-high 21 points in the Hawks' 67-64 nail-biter win over Glenbard West in Tuesday's East Aurora sectional semifinal.
Six-4 senior forward Mike Selvaggi joins several players rotating in at the second forward spot. Sophomore guard Frank Cleope has nailed 20 3's and came off the bench for 10 points against Glenbard West.
At the core, however, comes well-traveled junior Marc Little, a 13.2-point scorer known in his Driscoll days as "Red."
Bartlett's ascent coincided with the IHSA's decision to clear the free-wheeling point guard's transfer from Addison Trail -- where he spent his sophomore season after playing at Driscoll as a freshman.
"The addition of Little has ignited their team to extraordinary heights. He gives them what they were lacking, playmaking and team speed," Sutton said.
"They already have the size and physical attributes to be real good. With Little and Labedzki they now have two terrific perimeter players to go along with the giants."
Neuqua's many solid players often outweigh a select few very good ones.
The 12-deep Wildcats are not a collection of loose parts but a collective of important contributors.
Even if Todd Sutton's own son, junior guard Drew Sutton, comes off the bench just once to inbound the ball under an opponent's basket, it is a critical addition.
There is a solid center, literally. Senior 6-foot-8 center Dan Pawelski has quietly become Neuqua Valley's all-time rebounds leader and No. 3 in points.
Entering the Waubonsie Valley playoff game Pawelski and 6-5 junior forward Derek Raridon had scored the exact same number of points, 378. Pawelski is a steadying hand, Raridon a smooth full-court type who leads the Wildcats in 3-pointers and steals.
Todd Sutton has a guard and wing player for every occasion. Assists leaders Graham Smith and Nolan Brown, 3-ball shooters Brad Keeler and Anton Wilkins, defenders Steve Waeghe and T.J. Jordan -- whose defense Wednesday against Waubonsie Valley may have been season-saver in turning around a 10-point deficit.
Then there's Neuqua's own super-soph, 6-5 forward Dwayne Evans, who developed slowly after a preseason injury but has blossomed.
In the regular-season finale the fluid Evans scored a season-high 22 points, and he had a team-high 20 points in the Wildcats' 62-53 Willowbrook regional final win over West Aurora.
This is the core that won Neuqua's fourth regional title in its 10-year history.
After failing to win sectionals in 2001 and both 2006 and 2007, Sutton hopes to break through using his tried-and-true formula.
"Print the same lines as the last 10 years," he said. "Defense and rebounding are the keys."
St. Francis vs. Marshall:ŒMarshall coach Courtney Hargrays, star senior guard Ryan Hare and others from the top team in Class 3A were in the gym Wednesday night, watching the St. Francis boys basketball team flawlessly defeat Crane 53-46.
They absorbed the St. Francis student cheering section's ecstatic chant as the Spartans knocked off another favored playoff opponent.
"We heard 'We want Marshall' after the game," Hargrays said Thursday over the phone.
"Just be careful what you ask for sometimes. We're going to show up, I'll tell you that much."
Both the No. 1 seed Commandos (27-4) and No. 7 seed St. Francis (19-9) will show at 7:30 p.m. today for the Class 3A Riverside-Brookfield sectional championship.
Marshall's 74-62 win Tuesday over Suburban Catholic Conference co-champion Aurora Central Catholic, which split two games with third-place St. Francis, came without all-state candidate Hare, fellow Division 1 recruit Davarius Davis and starting point guard Ardarius Simmons.
All of them, about 45 points worth, were suspended for violating team rules.
"We will make a game-time decision (on their availability) depending on how we practice today," Hargrays said.
After seeing St. Francis run clinics in consecutive stunners over No. 2 St. Joseph and No. 3 Crane, the first-year coach vows that Marshall's focus will be more than game-time happenstance.
"We respect everyone," Hargrays said. "Obviously they're pretty good if they're playing in a sectional final. That's the way we're going to treat it and how the outcome is, that's what is. We just hope we're going to be on top."
On the other hand, St. Francis coach Shawn Healy realizes the magic of this carpet ride won't be nearly enough.
"It's got to be the best game we've played this year -- and then times it by 10," he said.
St. Francis last reached a sectional final in 1999. In the Class A Westmont championship Ryan Hogan, Mike Allen, Neal Shaughnessy and Co. lost 78-61 to a Providence-St. Mel team with future Division 1 players Levar Seals and Stanley Gaines.
"Whereas that team was a heavily favored conference champion which was kind of expected to win the regional," Healy said, "this group we have this year is more hang-loose, let it fly and see what happens."
St. Francis senior guards Dan McCoy and Jack Purdom are definitely in "let it fly" mode. Their penchant for hitting clutch 3-pointers is a main factor in the Spartans' ascension and drew a "fearless" tag from Healy after hitting seven 3's on Wednesday.
But the fundamentally sound interplay between those two and center Bob Vonderhaar, forwards Dave Palash and Brian McMahon and key reserves Jeff Howe and Ryan Ferguson so obviously surpasses "hang loose."
Of the Spartans' 17 field goals Tuesday, Healy said 15 came via assist through the motion offense.
Those fundamentals will be challenged immensely by the Commandos, who are deeper, more athletic and taller than St. Joe's or Crane.
Marshall, which has lost only to Hales Franciscan, Simeon, Whitney Young and Homewood-Flossmoor, will use up to five different presses, extending its defense on each St. Francis possession to create a fast pace and transition opportunities.
"That's our motto -- we must have pressure on the ball to win. We have to force as many turnovers as possible," said Hargrays, who led Marshall to the Chicago Public League title for the first time since his own senior season of 1991.
Healy said St. Francis will respond in a fine line between aggressive offense and precision passing to reduce the impact of 20-point scorer Hare and junior guard Darius Smith, who averages 18 points, 9 steals, 8 assists and 6 rebounds. Hargrays said Smith is being recruited by "just about everybody in America."
Healy said, "We have to attack their press for scores. We can't settle for (getting the ball to) halfcourt. There's some holes there. We've got to find it, and that comes back to crisp passing and receiving of the basketball. Those little things are going to be difference-makers.
"It's going to come down to fundamentals -- shooting, rebounding, and then defending. We're going to have to be really working like a well-oiled machine on all five cylinders and then some, in order to pull this off."
He added some of the spirit that's fueled St. Francis' fire: "They're not unbeatable."
-- David Oberhelman