Lake Park digs in and dispatches Bartlett

After all Lake Park has been through, it would have been easy for the Lancers to let this season go.

And when the Lancers fell behind Bartlett by 10 points in the second quarter Monday night, it seemed the Lancers would go with the season's flow. The Lancers, however, decided they weren't ready to move on.

Lake Park came back in the third quarter, then held on in the fourth to upset Bartlett 68-62 at the Class 4A Glenbard West regional.

"We worked on being patient," said interim coach Tom Bergen, who took over last week when Cray Allen resigned citing family reasons and had three practices to prepare his new team. "We made some adjustments offensively. We worked on helping each other a little more. They took care of the rest. I just tried to settle them down, balance themselves out and play team basketball."

In addition to losing their coach, the 22nd-seeded Lancers (5-22) also forfeited a few games earlier in the season because of an ineligible player and suffered a 20-game losing streak.

"It's nice," Lancers senior Lucas Antioho said of the regional win. "Yeah, I know it's been rough. Most of the games we did lose were close. I knew we could step it up just when playoff time came, maybe get a couple of wins here and there."

It helped that Bergen has known his seniors since they were freshmen. That came in handy when Bartlett's Marc Little converted a steal into a layup for a 28-18 Hawks lead midway through the second quarter.

"I basically talked to the kids and said it's simple," Bergen said. "It's their game, and it's always going to be their game. The deciding factor was going to be them."

The Lancers decided to bounce back. They whittled the Bartlett lead to 4 at halftime, then took the lead on an Antioho lay-in with 40 seconds to go in the third quarter.

The Lancers never let go of the lead, building it as high as 9 points on an Antioho three-point play, then making their free throws down the stretch to hold on when Bartlett (19-8) - the 11th seed and winner of nine straight entering Monday's game - cut the lead to 4.

"Lake Park's played an awful lot of close games," Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith said, "and they've had a little bit of chaos here down the stretch. Sometimes that brings a team together. I thought they played a heck of a game. They hustled. Seemingly every loose ball they got their hands on. They certainly hit the big shots when they needed to in the third quarter to take the lead and in the fourth quarter to extend the lead."

Antioho scored a team-high 17 points, to go with 9 rebounds. Danny Baylis and Matt Drufke added 12 apiece. The Lancers meet sixth-seeded Glenbard East at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday in the regional semifinals.

Little led all scorers with 24 points, Luke Labedzki added 14 and Frankie Cleope 10.