Elgin, St. Charles N. take matchup to the limits -- and beyond
If recent history is any indication, fans should settle in for a tense, long game when St. Charles North visits Elgin's Chesbrough Field House for an Upstate Eight Conference game tonight at 7:15 p.m.
The teams split the last two regular-season meetings, which both went to double overtime in St. Charles. Last season the North Stars defeated the Maroons 84-72. Elgin tagged St. Charles North with a 92-80 loss two years ago.
"I'm just going to talk to (North Stars coach) Tom (Poulin) before the game and say I don't care who wins as longs as the coaches don't have to have a heart attack with a nail biter late," joked Elgin coach Mike Sitter.
The teams also met in the Class 4A Larkin regional championship game last season, which Elgin won in regulation, 58-50.
The Maroons (5-6, 0-1) are coming off their second 12-day layoff of the season. Sitter gave his team time off initially after its 3-1 showing at the Elgin Holiday Tournament, but practices have since been building in intensity and culminated Wednesday in what the second-year coach called "a great practice."
The North Stars (7-5, 1-1) have virtually everyone back from the team that lost to Elgin last year in the regional final. Led by seniors Nick Neari and Jonathan DeMoss, St. Charles North reached the championship game of the Jacobs tournament for the second straight season before losing to the host team in the finale.
Rescheduled: Bartlett will play at St. Charles North this Saturday at 6 p.m. The game was postponed due to inclement weather on Dec. 19... Elgin will host Lake Park (5-9, 0-2) on Tuesday, Jan. 13 in another UEC game postponed due to bad weather on Dec. 19... A postponed nonconference game between Dundee-Crown and Belvidere North has not been rescheduled and may not be played unless the schools can agree upon a suitable date.
The airing of grievances: Simpler sometimes works better.
The boys basketball team from Hampshire (6-6, 1-0 Big Northern East) was struggling to digest the multiple concepts being taught by veteran coach Bob Barnett, so he obliged by streamlining the team's game-to-game approach after a candid team meeting on Monday.
"We had a nice conversation and some things were let loose," Barnett said. "We were bottling too much stuff in and we had to clear the air. The kids aired out a couple of thoughts, I went home and thought about what they said and they were right. I was just throwing too much stuff at them. I had tunnel vision, and we weren't doing anything with continuity.
"We got confused, and when they got confused they got mad. It snowballed. So we cleared the air Monday and had a meeting and a walk through before the game on Tuesday (a 49-28 win vs. Harvard). We went out and played very well with only 6 turnovers and did a good defensive job."
The Whip-Purs should contend with Richmond-Burton (6-7, 1-0) and two-time defending champion Burlington Central (6-4, 1-0) for the Big Northern Conference's East Division title. Hampshire will try to improve to 2-0 in league play on Saturday in a matinee at Marengo (0-12, 0-1). That game should start at approximately 2:30 p.m.
Is there a lid on that thing? Huntley is having trouble putting the biscuit in the basket.
The Red Raiders (6-7) were beaten 51-20 by Cary-Grove in a Fox Valley Conference crossover Tuesday night, a game in which they shot 18 percent from the field.
"I would like to just chalk it up to a bad shooting performance, but this is the third time in 13 games where we've shot the ball terribly," Huntley coach Marty Manning said. "We shot under 20 percent last night and under 30 percent against Jacobs.
We're going to go back to the drawing board here and maybe rethink what we're doing and our lineups and see if we can find something that works. It's just been appalling some of the shooting percentages from some of our supposed good shooters. I've been saying for the past few weeks that we'd come out of it, but we don't seem to be coming out of it."
Therefore, Manning will shake things up in coming games at Woodstock (3-10) on Friday and at Marian Central (7-8) on Tuesday.
"We'll try to change some things, maybe do some things differently offensively to get some easier shots and give teams different looks," Manning added. "It just doesn't seem to be working right now, which unfortunately leads us to feeling bad on the defensive end and not playing hard there either."
No letdown: Dundee-Crown (8-3) will try to carry over the momentum gained from Tuesday's 62-52 Fox Valley Conference crossover victory at up-and-coming Johnsburg (9-5) when the Chargers host Crystal Lake Central (3-11) on Friday night at 7 p.m.
Senior guard Jeff Beck scored 26 points against Johnsburg to pace the Chargers.
"We played pretty well (against Johnsburg) and it's human nature to kind of relax after you beat a pretty good team with two good players like (C.J.) Fiedorowicz and (Mike) Dixon," Dundee-Crown coach Lance Huber said. "Central is pretty well coached, has talent and they've had some injuries. They're probably as happy to see 2009 as any team in the state.
"In their minds they're 1-0 in 2009, so we have to focus like we're down in the count 0-2. We're just trying to put a full game together. I think in stretches we show that we can be very competitive with good teams and in other stretches you wonder which team is out there."
Crystal Lake Central forward Mike Fior returned this week from a broken wrist suffered against Jacobs in early December.
Practiced out: Larkin (6-7, 1-1) will host Waubonsie Valley (7-5, 1-1) in an Upstate Eight Conference clash on Saturday night at 6 p.m. The Warriors won their own holiday tournament two weeks ago.
"They have some talent," Larkin coach Larry Hight said Wednesday night while en route to scout the Warriors' home game against East Aurora (10-2, 2-0). "But that's the Upstate Eight Conference and that's just how it is with every team.
"We've had two weeks off without a game. We were dying for a practice during the (Elgin) holiday tournament and didn't get one because we were playing back-to-back-to-back. Now we've had enough practices to hold us for awhile, so we'll be ready to go Saturday night and look forward to the competition. Everybody's healthy and everybody's upbeat."
Hight said what has impresses him most about this year's Royals is the way the senior and junior classes have melded for the betterment of the team. "They get along great and it shows," Hight said.
Heads above water: St. Edward (6-8, 2-2) has a chance to eke above the .500 mark in Suburban Catholic Conference play for the first time since Keith Chuipek took over the floundering program three years ago. The Green Wave will play Marmion (5-9, 4-2) Friday night in Aurora.
St. Edward evened its SCC mark with a 54-51 home win over Montini (1-10, 1-4) on Tuesday night.
All-area senior guard Josh Dix rattled home a 3-pointer with 28 seconds left to lift the Wave to victory. That's a hopeful sign since Dix's shooting has been slightly off since he developed a case of mononucleosis during the Westminster Christian Thanksgiving Tournament, according to Chuipek.
If Dix breaks out, opponents will have to pay more attention to him on the perimeter, which will only give Riley Coleman more scoring opportunities. Coleman led the Green Wave with 17 points against Montini.
"We play the Cadets on Friday, another team I think we can play with," Chuipek said. "Then we'll see what happens against ACC on Saturday at home."
Aurora Central Catholic (13-1, 6-0) leads the SCC.
jfitzpatrick@dailyherald.com