South Elgin bounces back, tops McHenry

After a tough 51-48 Upstate Eight Conference home loss to St. Charles East, South Elgin's boys basketball team wanted to bounce back with a solid effort at McHenry Saturday night.

The resilient Storm got the job done.

South Elgin, which outscored McHenry 19-10 in the third quarter, cruised to 54-40 nonconference win over the Warriors.

"All season after a loss, we tell the kids they have to forget about it and go on to the next game," said South Elgin coach Chaz Taft. "We know McHenry is a very good, well-coached team. We know they shoot the 3 very well and they are never out of games. We had an hour bus ride, but I liked our focus and we had a solid effort."

The Storm (16-8) took a 27-20 lead into the intermission after Martin Duarte canned a 3-pointer before time expired. It was Duarte's only points in the game.

South Elgin, which played an almost flawless third quarter, made 8-of-10 shots and committed just 1 turnover in outscoring the Warriors (14-7) 19-10. The Storm took a 46-30 lead into the fourth quarter.

Holding a 30-23 lead, South Elgin grabbed control of the game with a 9-0 run. Tommy Childs scored 7 points including a 3-pointer during the run and freshman Jacob Maestranzi added a layup as the Storm extended a 7-point lead to 16, 39-23, with 2:43 left in the third quarter.

The Storm's biggest lead was 20, 50-30, after Sammy Sutter connected on a layup with 7 minutes left in the game.

Childs paced the Strom with 22 points and 4 assists.

"We played with no energy (Friday) night," said Childs. "We were determined to come out tonight and play hard the entire game and never take our foot off the pedal. Our defense was really good. We stayed in their face the whole game."

Maestranzi added 10 points with 4 assists and 4 steals for the winners.

Josh McNaughton led the Warriors with 10 points.

The Storm's aggressive defense held McHenry to only 25 percent shooting, making 15-of 60 shots from the field. McHenry, which committed 18 turnovers, made 5-of-25 from 3-point range.

Westminster Christian 55, East Dubuque 36: Ian Dutcher scored 18 points and Westminster Christian (18-8) overcame a 23-18 halftime deficit to down East Dubuque (18-6) at the River Ridge Shootout.

Ben Carani added 12 points and Ryan Beachler 11 for the Warriors.