Bright night without big star
Most of the people who braved the bitter cold Thursday night to pack the place at Hoffman Estates were probably a bit disappointed about 15 minutes before tipoff.
Cully Payne was dressed in road black just like his Schaumburg teammates. The only problem was Payne's persistent back pain forced him to wear a dress shirt, slacks and a blue tie for one of the big battle of Mid-Suburban West rivals.
"It was bad," Payne said of a problem that will send him for a bone scan today.
No doubt it must have been since the Alabama-bound guard lives for these kinds of games. But his teammates went out and showed they could play Payne-free as they moved into a tie for first in the MSL West with a 61-51 victory.
"This is what we do," said Schaumburg coach Bob Williams. "We don't whine or cry about who's not here. We never have.
"What we've always done is focus on who is here."
And the spotlight was on a lot of guys who delivered at various times in a game it led the last 251/2 minutes.
"Everyone was stepping up," said senior Josh Spandiary.
Starting with football all-area receiver who brought a lot of early offense with 9 first-quarter points.
Perish Bell chipped in 12 points and handled the ball most of the night. Justin Swiercz scored 9 of his 16 points in the final 81/2 minutes.
Declan Geraghty and Chris Kelly made sure Hoffman and Luke Mead never got comfortable offensively. The Saxons also got a big boost off a bench where talented third-year varsity player Blake Mueller has been sitting all year because of a torn ACL in his knee.
Joe Infusino had 6 points and a crucial 3-point play after Hoffman got within 5 points with 4:06 to play. Richard Barnes had 4 points and 5 rebounds and junior Glenn Frost helped provide some second-quarter distance with a sweet drive across the lane and a 3.
"Once we found out Cully wasn't playing, coach made sure we all didn't get down," Swiercz said. "Defensively we played great and got after it.
After all, how often do you hear a player say "we got a lot of production from kids defensively" as Bell did afterward?
It left quite an impression on Hoffman.
"What we saw tonight was a team without its star that really played together as a group," said Hoffman coach Bill Wandro.
"They picked it up because their main guy wasn't there and our guys were victims of it in a way.
"In a way the advantage was the motivation Schaumburg had to play at a high level. As a team it's a thing we have to learn when we see somebody do it right, we have to strive to understand we're capable of doing the same thing."
No doubt the Saxons want a healthy Payne back sooner than later. But they showed they aren't going to hold any pity parties.
"We are missing a big part of our team," Bell said. "But at the same time we all put in a good effort every game. Without Cully we did the fundamentals and played defense."
mmaciaszek@dailyherald.com