Zion-Benton edges Libertyville

Zion-Benton's boys basketball team looked like it was going to breeze by visiting Libertyville.

But the Wildcats tried to claw back and came up just short, losing 55-53 in a North Suburban Conference Lake Division game Saturday night.

With his team down 35-20 at halftime, Libertyville's John Colao, who was scoreless in the first half, led the comeback by scoring all 15 of his points in the second half, including two key 3-point shots in the fourth quarter.

"In the first half, I wasn't (hitting shots) and in the second half I was," Colao said. "It wasn't anything specific, but sometimes you hit shots and sometimes you don't, and the second half they went in."

Billy Meyer (13 points) sank a layup to bring the Wildcats within 54-53 with less than a minute left in the fourth quarter.

But Zion-Benton's Lenzelle Smith, who led all scorers with 20 points, shut the door with a foul shot with three seconds left.

"We almost came back to win this one," Meyer said. "We had a chance to win, but we missed a couple of buckets at the end."

Midway through the third quarter, Libertyville's Luke Mathewson received an accidental elbow in his face by a Zee-Bee defender and had to be taken to the hospital to get some stitches.

"When you see one of your guys go down, you want to fight back and win and that's what I told the guys in the huddle (during a timeout)," Meyer said. "We wanted to win the game for (Mathewson), but we came up short."

Libertyville (4-3, 2-1) had a chance to tie the score, but Ryan Barth missed a jumper at the buzzer.

Hobie Herberger led Libertyville with 19 points.

"I thought we made a great run at them and I thought we did a great job at the defensive end," Libertyville coach Scott Bogumil said. "We had some good looks in the first half and just didn't make them. We got on a little role and I thought Lenzelle Smith made a big difference for them. He was a real monster on the boards late in the game and got a couple of shots. When they needed a bucket from him he converted. We just ran out of time at the end."

Also for Zion-Benton (4-4, 2-1), Owen Worthington scored 11 points.

"We played a real solid first half," Zion-Benton coach Don Kloth said. "Libertyville struggled with their shooting in the first half, and I felt that one of the keys in the second half was that Libertyville shot well from the perimeter. They have a strong team, and they almost came back."