Hard work pays off, Huntley holds off D-C
All of Huntley's hard work paid off.
After the Red Raiders' 60-50 loss to Dundee-Crown in the championship game of last Saturday's Leland G. Strombom tournament in Sycamore, coach Marty Manning made his team pay in practice.
The result was a 44-41 victory over the very same Chargers' team, this time spoiling Dundee-Crown's home opener in a Fox Valley Conference crossover.
"They beat us up last time in the fourth quarter," Huntley forward Jordan Neukirch said. "It wasn't the easiest week of practice."
Friday night's game wasn't exactly a breeze for the Red Raiders (3-1) either.
The Chargers (3-1) hung with Huntley for the entire game, but could not convert a last-second 3-point attempt with 1 second left to play. Dundee-Crown had many chances before that, though.
The Chargers missed 2 pairs of free throws in the fourth quarter, the last from Charles Kimbrough (15 rebounds, 4 offensive) with 15.5 seconds left and Huntley leading 43-41.
Justin Strzelczyk also missed a 3-pointer with 2 seconds remaining, which would have given the Chargers their first lead since going up 31-30 in the third quarter.
"The last time we played them, we were there in the fourth quarter and couldn't close it out," Huntley coach Marty Manning said. "We wanted to avenge losing to them the last time."
The Red Raiders narrowly closed this one out.
Huntley went 2 of 8 from the free throw-line in the final 2 minutes, missing out on a chance to widen the gap. Brett DePorter missed a pair of foul shots with 2 seconds remaining, which set up the Chargers' final shot.
Huntley never led by more than 7 points in the fourth quarter. The Red Raiders did not make a basket after Zac Boster broke loose for his first two 3-point attempts of the game giving Huntley a 40-33 lead with 6:40 remaining. Boster (10 points) did extend Huntley's lead to 40-33 with the 3-pointers.
"We worked on (defending Boster) a lot," Chargers' coach Lance Huber said. "Those were huge shots. It was lack of execution on our part."
Dundee-Crown answered back with point guard Jeff Beck. Beck, who led all scorers with 18 points, converted a 3-point play after driving to the basket and drawing a foul to bring the Chargers back to 41-38 with 4:37 left. On the Chargers' next possession, Beck drew a foul and split a pair of free throws to make it a 2-point game (41-39).
Neukirch, who had the task of guarding Beck for most of the evening, led the Red Raiders with 15 points on a 7 of 13 shooting effort. Beck finished 6 of 14, with 4 assists and 2 steals.