Larkin celebrates emotional day with a big win
Larkin concluded one of the more disappointing days in the history of its boys basketball program with one of its most inspired victories Friday night: a 37-36 win against visiting South Elgin.
Larkin was informed Friday by the IHSA that first-year coach Deryn Carter's suspension would be upheld for the remainder of the season. The school was placed on probation, and the boys basketball team was forced to forfeit its 7 victories. Carter was suspended by the IHSA a week ago for not being properly certified, a violation of IHSA bylaws.
Larkin (1-23, 1-8) entered the Upstate Eight contest in Elgin against its District U-46 rival on a 13-game losing streak, but a putback basket by senior Garrett McDaniel with 4 seconds to play staked the Royals to a 37-36 lead, the last of three lead changes in the game's final 1:28.
South Elgin (16-9, 5-4) played under the direction of assistant coach Corey Toppel because Storm coach Chaz Taft was with his wife, who went into labor Friday afternoon.
Toppel called timeout with 2.9 seconds left. The Storm inbounded the ball to senior Tommy Childs, who heaved a shot from just beyond midcourt. His desperation attempt was directly on line, but the ball caught the front of the rim, setting off an emotional on-court celebration.
Administrators could not contain the elated Larkin student section. Fans immediately charged the floor to celebrate the end of the losing streak, mobbing McDaniel, who also received a congratulatory hug from Larkin Principal Jon Tuin. The win was Larkin's first against South Elgin in four seasons.
"It feels so good to get this win," McDaniel said. "We just found out today that coach Carter was gone for the whole season. We needed this one for him. It feels so good to get this monkey off our back. It's a big relief."
"It's finally over," Larkin senior Ryan Smith said. "It feels great to break this streak. It hurt us a lot earlier to find out that coach Carter wasn't going to be back this season. Coach Carter was upset. We were upset. We wanted to play our hearts out today for coach Carter and we did."
McDaniel had given Larkin a 35-34 lead with 1:28 remaining when he scored in the low post after a head fake, but South Elgin retook the lead when freshman Jake Maestranzi fed senior Sam Jordt with a bounce pass for an inside bucket with 33 seconds left.
Larkin interim coach Steve Knapp called timeout with 15.7 seconds left and drew up a play. "We wanted to run double to me," McDaniel said, "but we could see they were going to double team me so we got it back to (guard) Drew (Simonini).
Simonini's baseline shot from 12 feet flew over the rim, but McDaniel snared the rebound and sank what turned out to be the game-winning shot.
"They got it to one of their shooters, but it didn't hit the rim and it went right to their guy," Jordt said. It's tough. Right place, right time, right miss. I mean, everything went right for them at the end. There was nothing you could do."
McDaniel led the Royals with 9 points to go with 5 rebounds. Senior Ramadan Adili and freshman Carlito Singleton each scored 7 points for Larkin.
Childs finished with a game-best 12 points, junior Sam Sutter had 9 points and Jordt contributed 8 points and 10 rebounds for South Elgin.
Cars filled with celebrating Larkin students could still be heard honking horns in the parking lot 30 minutes after the game.
"The kids have gone through so much this year that I, maybe, couldn't have handled as a player," Knapp said. "But they came out like nothing happened. It's huge for the program and huge for everyone at Larkin."
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<li><a href="/story/?id=360527">Larkin on probation, forfeits wins <span class="date">[02/19/10]</span></a></li>
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