Big second half pushes St. Viator past Carmel

History is well within reach for St. Viator.

The Lions knew in November that with a ton of experience back, this season could be special. Now, they're on the verge of having it be record-setting.

By outlasting Carmel 59-46 Wednesday night in a draining, physical East Suburban Catholic Conference battle, visiting St. Viator hit a milestone in earning its 20th win of the season.

If the Lions can snag a victory in the first round of the state tournament next week, they'll tie their school record for most wins in a season (21).

"If we can then win a regional title, we'll set the school record," Viator coach Joe Majkowski said after the program's fifth 20-win season and first since 2004-05. "But we've got to get that first (tournament) win first."

Likewise, the Lions (20-6, 8-5 ESCC) knew that they needed to first take care of business against Carmel in order to keep talk of a record on the table.

They pushed their agenda hard in the third quarter by outscoring the Corsairs 21-6, which made up for a slow start.

Carmel, which hosted the game in its smaller, older auxiliary gym for more ambience, owned a 1-point lead at the end of the first quarter (13-12) and the teams were tied at halftime (23-23).

"They (Carmel) came ready, they were pretty physical, but we came out of halftime pretty strong and ran away with it at the end," said St. Viator senior forward Richard McLoughlin, who finished with a game-high 18 points. He and Alan Aboona, who scored 16 points, have been on varsity since their sophomore year and are a part of that veteran core that gave Majkowski such high hopes at the start of the season.

"I think we can make a special run this season," McLoughlin said. "It should be fun."

The Corsairs (10-16, 3-10 ESCC) were having their own fun early on.

Playing an 11-man rotation throughout most of the game via wholesale, five-for-five substitutions, Carmel got fresh legs inserted into the game every few minutes. That helped the Corsairs shoot well early.

Patrick Cox made all 3 of his first quarter field goals and wound up with 9 points before halftime.

But then he and the Corsairs went cold, hitting on just 2 of 10 shots in the third quarter. Both buckets were from Tim Hendricks.

"We tend to not be focused after halftime sometimes and we've been trying to work on that ," said Cox, who finished with 12 points. He was the only player on his team to finish in double-figures. "We've got to get that figured out because the playoffs are coming up now."

No matter what happens in the state tournament, the Corsairs have already deemed this season a success.

At the end of last month, they hit one of their major goals when they got their 10th win of the season.

"It's been a whole decade since we've had 10 wins in a season here," Cox said. "We're the ground floor of the Carmel rebuilding program."