Grand production from Mundelein's big three

Upon visiting the Grand Canyon on its trip to Arizona over the holidays, the Mundelein boys basketball team was already in the right frame of mind.

The Mustangs were used to thinking big even before they were wowed by nature and won the consolation championship of the Desert Classic at Cactus Shadows High School in Cave Creek, near Scottsdale.

Before flying west, Mundelein also won the consolation championship of the Jacobs Holiday tournament, getting big-time - we're talking Grand Canyon big - performances out of its Big Three.

Ben Brust and Ryan Sawvell, who made the all-tournament team at Jacobs, were often better than usual out west, and fabulous freshman Robert Knar inched closer to superstar status with each passing game.

Prior to leaving, Knar went off for a career-high 32-point game at Jacobs. He averaged 19 points for the tournament while Brust and Sawvell were at 23 and 19 points per game, respectively. Sawvell had a 36-point game against Prairie Ridge.

In Arizona, Brust had a 50-point game and Sawvell went off for 29 points and 19 rebounds in his best game, the championship.

"Our top three guys played really well (over the holidays)," Mundelein coach Dick Knar said. "Ben was Ben and Ryan was really solid, especially in Arizona. Between Jacobs and Arizona, we played 10 games in 12 days and when everyone else was tired and had enough, he kept going. He was our most consistent player out there."

Surprise, surprise: While Ryan Sawvell was Mr. Consistent for Mundelein, Knar says that his most surprising player over the break was his son, Robert.

"I knew he had a chance to be a good player, but -" Knar said. "This stretch (over the holidays) was as good as I've seen him play. I was surprised by him. He really had a couple of great tournaments for a freshman."

Besides his offense, which included 6 three-pointers in his 32-point game at Jacobs, Knar also created for his teammates, rolling up 11 and 10 assists against Cary-Grove and Prairie Ridge respectively.

"He's getting it done in different ways," Knar said of his son. "The great thing about him is that he's a really easy kid to coach. He's not emotional. He doesn't get too high or too low."

The youngest Knar will need that kind of perspective as he continues through his career. Coach Knar said that his son is already getting all kinds of college mail, from schools such as North Carolina, Indiana, Wisconsin, Illinois and Virginia.

"(In Arizona), we roomed Robert with Ben (Brust, who was heavily recruited and chose Iowa) and he really enjoyed that because they got to talk a lot about basketball and college," Knar said. "It's going to really help Robert in a lot of ways to get a year of being around Ben. He's going to learn a lot."

Good point: Mundelein might have three big-league scorers in Ben Brust, Ryan Sawvell and Robert Knar, but it's possible none of them would be quite as proficient without Leavon Head.

The 5-10 junior runs the show at point.

"We've gone 8-2 in our last 10 games and Leavon is a big reason why," said Mundelein coach Dick Knar, whose team is 13-6 overall. "He's doing a great job of setting us up, of calling plays, of talking and communicating. He does a great job of recognizing how and when to get the ball to our top three scorers.

"And then on the defensive end, he's been a real defensive stopper. Leavon has been so huge for us."

Right side: History was on Vernon Hills' side over the holidays.

It was an easy motivational tool for head coach Matt McCarty, who enticed his players by telling them that by getting a win in their opening game of the Wheeling Hardwood Classic, they would be the first team at the school to ever play in the winner's bracket of the tournament.

The Cougars responded by not only opening with a win, but beating a Loyola team that significantly outsized them in the process.

"That was a tough draw for us in the opening round because they are really tall. They've got a 6-foot-8 kid and three 6-foot-7 kids," McCarty said. "Plus, Loyola has a great tradition at Wheeling. They've won the tournament like three of the last five years and last year they beat us along the way.

"But we weren't intimidated and we did a really good job with our post defense and our help defense and we were able to slow down their big guys."

The Cougars weren't able to slow down Deerfield, but also beat Stevenson and finally Notre Dame in the fifth place game.

DaVaris Daniels had 36 points against Stevenson and averaged 27.3 points per game over the tournament, the highest scorer in the 16-team field. Daniels was named to the all-tournament team.

"DaVaris did a great job getting to the basket, attacking the basket. He also shot a lot of free throws and hit his 3-pointers," McCarty said. "He had a really great tournament. I thought our team did overall. To come out of there 3-1, to play on the winner's side for the first time and to beat some very good teams, it's was all very positive for our kids."

Vernon Hills also got a good showing out of Stephen and Brandon Curry, who provided a nice scoring punch on the perimeter, and Chris Morgan, who rolled up 20 assists to tie Stevenson's Jeff Levitt for most assists in the tournament.

Double duty: Holiday tournament basketball wasn't the only thing that kept Vernon Hills junior DaVaris Daniels busy over his break.

After the Cougars finished up play at the Wheeling Hardwood Classic, Daniels flew down to Florida where he had been invited to participate in the Under Armour football combine in Tampa.

The top 100 juniors in the nation participated in the event, which measured skills such as 40 time and vertical leap.

"I know DaVaris was tired (after the tournament), but he came back and told us that out of all 100 kids he had the top vertical," Vernon Hills coach Matt McCarty said.

And that vertical was?

"Forty-one and a half inches," McCarty said happily. "That skill can come in handy in basketball."

Good Rappaport: A .500 record at the State Farm Classic in Bloomington over the holidays is nothing to sneeze it.

After all, quality teams such as North Chicago and defending Class 3A state champion Champaign Centennial were in the mix.

"If you told me before the tournament that we'd be 2-2 down there, I'd be pretty happy considering who you have to play," Grayslake Central coach Brian Moe said. "There are some really good teams and some really good players in that tournament."

Moe is especially familiar with one of them.

Senior Josh Rappaport held his own with a talented bunch that includes North Chicago's high-scoring sophomore guard Aaron Simpson and Rock Island's Chasson Randle, a junior guard who has already committed to Illinois.

Rappaport, a 6-foot-4 senior, made the tournament's prestigious 6-player all-tournament team after averaging 20.8 points over four games. He had games of 26 points against both Rock Island and North Chicago, a win and a three-point loss (64-61) loss, respectively.

"Josh had a great tournament," Moe said. "He's on that all-tournament team with some very impressive players. We almost beat North Chicago because of him. He had like 10 points in the last minute and a half. He did a nice job of getting the ball inside and taking advantage of his size."

Heir Jordan: With senior Darius Decany and sophomore Jordan Taylor starting the season splitting time at point guard, Taylor clearly seemed to be the heir apparent at that position for Grayslake Central.

Over the holidays, the Rams got a preview of what the team might look like when Taylor takes over the controls for good.

Decany went down with a calf injury and hasn't played in the last three games. That forced Taylor to pick up the slack and play more minutes than he's typically used to.

Not that it seemed to be a stretch for Taylor.

"Jordan wound up really talking the lead for us with his ball-handling," Grayslake Central coach Brian Moe said. "He handled the pressure, he also got to the basket off of dribble penetration. He got some big baskets for us."

Taylor had one of his best showings against Champaign Centennial. He had 14 points.

"He's made so much progress and we're just hoping it continues," Moe said of Taylor. "One of the things we really like about him is that he has the ability to create for himself and others and we don't have a lot of that."

Unusual suspects: It's common to see opposing basketball coaches meet up at halfcourt and exchange friendly banter for a few minutes prior to tip-off.

At Warren on Friday, when Lake Zurich coach John Zarr and Warren coach Chuck Ramsey get their chance to chat, they'll have plenty to commiserate about.

Warren and Lake Zurich are two typically strong programs that are struggling so far this season.

Warren, which advanced to the sectional finals last season, won two sectionals in the last four years and hasn't had a losing season in 29 years, is currently 2-8. And Lake Zurich, which has had only two sub-.500 campaigns in the last 15 years, is just 1-12.

"This is definitely uncharted territory that we're in," Zarr said. "We're not used to this at all."

Likewise, at Warren, history is being made, just not the good kind.

"We've never had a start like this," Ramsey said. "It's quite frustrating. We're definitely not happy campers."

And yet, both coaches are committed to finding happiness in the end. Two of the most tenured coaches in Lake County, Ramsey and Zarr know better than to give up now.

"We're just going to keep working at it," Ramsey said.

"We're just trying to keep upbeat, keep improving," Zarr said.

Off target: Effort? Check. Hard work? Check. Defense? Check. Rebounding? Check.

Lake Zurich is doing some of the most important things any team needs to do to put wins on the board.

But en route to a 1-12 mark, the Bears are struggling to do perhaps the most important thing: put the ball in the basket. They've struggled to score all season.

"Defensively, we're a pretty decent team. We give up about 50 points a game," Lake Zurich coach John Zarr said. "We're just not scoring enough. We're struggling with our shooting. I mean, (at the Pekin Holiday tournament), we missed seven uncontested layups underneath in one game. You just scratch your head."

Zarr says his squad is averaging just 42 points, far below normal. The Bears are also shooting just 32 percent from the field. Normally, that number is right around 50 percent.

"At the beginning, we were concerned about our shot selection," Zarr said. "I think we got that problem corrected, but we're still having trouble making shots with any consistency. We also work a lot on the mechanics of shooting, we put our guys in pressure situations to practice how to shoot when that's a factor. So, we work a lot on shooting. At this point, I think a lot of (the shooting slump) is in the psychology of shooting."

Zarr says his instincts are telling him that even more repetition at practice should help his players snap out of their shooting slumps. Then again, he also hasn't ruled out some more unorthodox approaches like visualization and meditation.

"We'll also have a new wrinkle or two that we'll start using that should help us to get easier shots as often as we can," Zarr said. " But what we really need is to get two or three kids to snap out of this and to put together a few good, consistent games.

"That could help the whole team get some confidence and we'll start to win some games. Our defense has been so solid that if we get any kind of offense whatsoever, we're going to get some victories."

That hurts: The scene was eerie in the Lake Zurich gym earlier this week.

Junior Tyler Every was moving through drills like he had dozens of times before. But on a routine, uncontested drive to the basket, the 6-foot-6 center experienced anything but the routine.

Every came down funny on his left leg and his knee buckled.

He ended up tearing pretty much everything: the patella tendon, the meniscus. He even snapped his growth plate.

Every underwent surgery on Wednesday at Lutheran General Hospital and will be out four to six months, which means he's done for the season.

"It was the weirdest thing to see because there was no one around Tyler. It was pretty scary," said Lake Zurich coach John Zarr, who is already looking forward to Every's return. Every is projected to top out at 6-foot-10.

New day, new problem: At Warren, where winning basketball games is almost always a foregone conclusion, the boys' 2-8 record is troubling enough.

But what makes it even more frustrating is that there doesn't seem to be a quick cure-all in coach Chuck Ramsey's medicine cabinet.

That's because Warren's ills are many, and constantly changing.

"There's not just one thing that has given us trouble," Ramsey said. "In different games, it seems like it can be different problems.

"Against Peoria Manual, we had 30 turnovers. Some games, we just get really out-numbered at the free throw line. We're averaging 15.1 free throws a game and our opponents are at 22.3 a game. Other games we get out-rebounded or out-shot. Sometimes we're in the position to get wins, like against New Trier and Libertyville, and we just don't finish. It's just a number of different things."

But those are only the tangibles.

Ramsey says that there is one consistent shortcoming that has factored into his team's sluggish start thus far.

"The one consistent theme I see is that we just have to play harder," Ramsey said. "We have to be more aggressive, more physical. We have a nice group of kids, but maybe too nice. Sometimes it seems like they'd rather be playing the game in tuxedos.

"We've been a very soft basketball team and we have to change that. This isn't about X's and O's or about strategy. It's about toughness, physical and mental toughness and we need some guys to step forward and take the lead on that."

One player who stepped up his game in Pontiac over the holidays was Darius Paul. The sophomore guard had 11 points and 9 rebounds in a loss to Bloomington.

Back in action: Lineup changes have been more common than usual at Warren this season as coach Chuck Ramsey searches for a combination that works.

Ramsey has also had to fill voids left by Jeremiah Jackson and Jameris Smith, starters who have both been inactive in recent weeks because of injuries.

Jackson was forced to miss four games in December to nurse a thigh injury that involved some internal bleeding and Smith injured his knee in practice just before the holidays and missed two games.

In Pontiac, both returned to the rotation and seemed to make up for lost time.

Jackson scored 13 points and pulled down 9 rebounds against Peoria Manual and Smith scored 15 points and had 8 steals against Bloomington.