It's No. 300 for Evans as Mustangs prevail

The stakes for the Mundelein girls basketball team were high Friday night as the Mustangs faced Libertyville in the Lady Mustangs Holiday Tournament.

First, the Mustangs were trying to get back into the title game after falling short last year. Second, coach Brian Evans entered the contest just 1 win shy of 300 career victories. And lastly, the Mustangs were looking for a little payback after suffering a loss to the Wildcats nearly a month ago.

With relative ease the Mustangs accomplished all three tasks. Mundelein rode a strong fourth quarter to pull away from Libertyville and win 50-32. Mundelein will face Hoffman Estates in the title game Saturday night at 8 p.m. Libertyville will play Cary-Grove in the third-place game at 6:30 p.m.

Mundelein (12-2) also earned Evans his 300th career win in his 19th season of coaching basketball. The usually stoic Evans put the win in perspective.

"We just needed a win tonight," he said. "Any time you can get a win over a team in your conference, whether it is in the tournament or in the season, it's a good win."

Leading 41-29 into the fourth quarter, Mundelein turned to its defense. The Mustangs held Libertyville without a field goal for over eight minutes and limited the Wildcats to only a free throw in that stretch. On the other end of the court, senior J.J. Sawchuk proved to be too much for the Wildcats to handle.

Sawchuk scored a season high 21 points to lead all scorers as the Mustangs used an 11-0 run to seal the win.

"We worked in practice this morning on our offense against a zone," Sawchuk said. "We knew Libertyville was a good team and they would come out strong. We just had to play our game and play good defense because we didn't the last time we played against them."

Libertyville (8-7) closed to within 39-29 with 1:42 to go in the third quarter on a 3-point play from Hannah Walton (5 points). Unfortunately for the Wildcats, that is where their offense came to a screeching halt.

"We didn't match Mundelein's energy tonight," Libertyville coach Kathie Swanson said. "Mentally we struggled at the end and that was very disappointing."

Toni Knar joined Sawchuk in double figures with 12 points. Savannah Trees led the Wildcats with 11 points.