St. Edward off to 3-0 start with win over Kirkland

With Suburban Catholic Conference play opening in a week for the St. Edward boys basketball team, coach Keith Chuipek was hoping for a good start do the season.

The Green Wave is off to just that, improving to 3-0 with a 60-32 victory Friday night over Kirkland Hiawatha at the Westminster Christian Thanksgiving Classic.

"This is a boost for us because we start conference play next Friday already," Chuipek said. "This is a good confidence builder to beat teams that we should compete with."

St. Edward, which plays Aurora Central Catholic next Friday, only trailed for 10 seconds against the Hawks. Hiawatha's Jason Keneway scored 20 seconds into the first quarter. The Green Wave answered with a 3-pointer from DJ Burns. St. Edward jumped out to a 12-4 lead in the opening 5-plus minutes and led 12-6 after the first quarter.

The Hawks got within 4, 15-11, in the second quarter before the Green Wave outscored Hiawatha 12-4 during the final 3 minutes to take a 27-15 halftime lead. The Green Wave had a 5-point play during the stretch as Burns hit a 3-pointer and Steve Martin was fouled as players battled for position. Martin hit both free throws.

Martin, Riley Coleman and Burns connected to open the third quarter as the Green Wave increased the lead to 19, 34-15.

St. Edward led by as many as 31, 57-26, in the fourth quarter. The Green Wave held Hiawatha to just 24 percent shooting (10 of 42).

"Out of the 15 points (the Hawks) had at halftime, probably 9 were because of offensive rebounds," Chuipek said. "We're trying to focus on that to be complete on defense."

Coleman led St. Edward with 17 points. Burns, Martin and Zach VonAhnen each added 9 points. The Green Wave were without starting senior guard Josh Dix (doctor's orders), who is expected to return to the lineup Saturday as St. Edward plays Westminster Christian in the final game of the tournament.