Attitude adjustment benefits Warren

There's nothing like a stern talking to and a mid-game benching to get a basketball player's attention.

Now multiply that by five and that's sending a pretty powerful message.

Just ask the starters at Warren. On Saturday night against Mundelein, their head coach, Chuck Ramsey, seemed to get through to them loud and clear by using the aforementioned methods.

Not liking how his starters had opened the game, he pulled all five of them midway through the first quarter and then gave them an earful while they got some extended bench time.

"They weren't doing much right," Ramsey said. "We established before the game what we wanted to do on offense and defense and we weren't doing either one."

By the time the starters returned midway through the second quarter, Warren's solid second unit had turned a small deficit into a modest lead.

Invigorated and anxious to prove themselves, the starters then moved the Blue Devils even further ahead. Before long, Warren had a comfy double-digit lead that kept growing en route to a 67-48 North Suburban Conference Lake Division victory.

The win moves Warren, which got a career-high 25 points out of center James Poliquin, to 17-4 overall and 8-3 in the Lake Division.

Mundelein loses its sixth game in a row, dropping to 9-14 overall and 1-9 in the Lake.

"Our main keys were to play good defense and rebound and we weren't doing that," said Poliquin, who did, however, get the job done inside on the offensive end. He punished the undersized Mustangs in the paint over and over again. "(Ramsey) took us out so that we could get our minds together and I think it made us see what was really important.

"He's done it before in games and practice. He's not afraid to do it. It definitely makes us get back on track."

Warren's reserves also had the same effect.

They turned a 12-11 deficit at the end of a sloppy first quarter into a 20-14 Warren lead just three minutes into the second quarter on five quick points by Ryan Maguire and buckets by Marquise Thomas and Jeff Kemp.

"The (reserves) were great tonight," Poliquin said. "They're great to play with. They do their job very well. We can go to them when we need them and we can go to them when we need breaks. We can do a lot of things with our guys on the bench that some other teams don't have the luxury of doing."

Nine players scored for Warren. Only Poliquin and Illinois-bound guard Brandon Paul (14 points) hit double figures, but Maguire and Kemp combined to add 11 points off the bench. And junior guard Craig Burton, normally a reserve who started in place of a sick David Duncan, had 9 points for the Blue Devils. "We've got a really good bench," said Paul, who wowed the crowd with a thunderous dunk in the fourth quarter. "Whenever we get tired or mess up, they come in and they lift us up."

Warren turned a 33-22 halftime advantage into a 20-point lead by putting together a 13-4 run over the first five minutes of the third quarter. Poliquin was huge during that stretch, scoring 10 of the 13 points with strong moves inside.

Of course, it didn't help the Mustangs that their top interior defender, Aaron Metzger, was having to spend much of the game on the bench in foul trouble.

"Our other big guy (Drew Herchenbach) also got a couple fouls so we were down to our third and fourth big guys," Mundelein coach Dick Knar said. "That was tough."

Senior guard Kevin Barber proved to be pretty tough for the Mustangs. He played every single minute of the game and netted a team-high 20 points on 3 three-pointers.

"In the second half, we just lost our confidence," Barber said. "We were less intense. They're just bigger and stronger than us. They're a tough team to play against."