McHenry's long-range attack stops Wauconda

It only made sense to assume the worst.

Having just finished their own game at Wauconda, the players on the McHenry freshman basketball team were congregated outside the visiting locker room, waiting to get their stuff.

They waited and waited and waited as the varsity squad, which had just concluded its own game against Wauconda, holed up in the locker room for its post-game meeting.

For 20-plus minutes, the freshmen waited.

Such a long postgame meeting, they figured, could mean only one thing.

"They lost, right?" one freshman asked.

Well, not exactly.

The McHenry freshmen were a bit surprised to learn that the varsity actually defeated Wauconda on Saturday night, and quite handily, too, 50-34.

Problem was, the Warriors weren't quite happy with the way they played in their nonconference win, and head coach Tim Paddock figured his team needed a bigger (and longer) pick-me-up than even after some losses.

"It was definitely our longest (post-game meeting) of the year," said McHenry guard Josh McNaughton, who finished with a team-high 13 points and was the only player on his team to reach double-figures. "It was our shooting. We were struggling from all over. It felt like nothing was going down and we were getting frustrated, so that's why it wasn't as happy of a win.

"We were glad that we won, but it just wasn't the way we would have wanted. Coach was like, 'It doesn't matter if your shot goes down, you just have to be thinking about the next one and the next one. You just have to keep shooting it.' He said that a lot of teams shoot around 30 percent, which is what we shot tonight. But we're used to shooting a lot higher so that's why we were frustrated."

The Warriors are also used to shooting, and making, more 3-pointers.

They hit 4 from downtown against Wauconda, but only two came when the game was still being hotly contested.

Two others came after McHenry cleared its bench with a 15-point lead and several minutes remaining in the game.

Typically, the Warriors make at least seven or eight 3-pointers each game.

"I was just telling the guys that we have to have short-term memory offensively," said Paddock, whose team improves to 14-5 overall. "They weren't happy with the way they shot, with the way they went about things (offensively). I mean, I saw guys who didn't want to take shots (because they were afraid they were going to miss). I could see it in their eyes. I told them that shots not going down happens in this game. You've just got to let it go. It's not a game of perfect. You've got to just keep shooting like it is going down."

What saved McHenry, which was tied with Wauconda after the first quarter (7-7) and up just eight points (25-17) at halftime, is that Wauconda wasn't getting many of its shots to fall either.

The Bulldogs (6-18 overall) finished with a 33 percent clip from the field, hitting just 15 of 46 shots.

Only Tyler Gick reached double-figures for Wauconda. He racked up a game-high 15 points.

"The ball just didn't bounce our way," Wauconda coach Scott Luetschwager said. "When you shoot that poorly, you're not going to get it done.

"All around, it was poor shooting on both sides, but they hustled and they were physical and they worked hard and that was the difference."