Slamming good time for Smith, Zion-Benton
The final buzzer sounded on his team's 79-75 victory, and then Lenzelle Smith remembered what he had told Zion-Benton's student fans.
So, as he dribbled unguarded near the foul line, the Zee-Bees senior suddenly tossed the basketball off the backboard, grabbed it before it hit the court and threw down a vicious left-handed slam dunk.
Let the celebration begin.
The athletic maneuver was superfluous, as it capped a night that had already provided more than enough thrills, including a furious fourth-quarter frenzy by host North Chicago in Wednesday's North Suburban Conference boys basketball championship game.
"It just was just something that I told (Zion-Benton's fans) before the game that I was going to do," Smith said of his flashy dunk, which didn't count. "I forgot all about it during the game because I was trying to get the 'W.'"
That's what Zion-Benton wanted most of all, and Smith helped deliver the Zee-Bees' second NSC title in three years and fifth overall in nine seasons.
His 28 points, 17 rebounds and 7 assists helped Zion-Benton (20-10) overcome a gutsy effort by North Chicago (17-7), which played without sophomore star Aaron Simpson but received a career-high 33 points from senior guard Demetrius Starks.
Simpson broke two bones in his left (non-shooting) hand during the Warhawks' game against Notre Dame on Saturday night and is expected to miss next week's regional. If North Chicago advances to the sectional, Simpson said he's hoping to play then.
Starks scored 18 points in the fourth quarter, helping the hosts get back in the game after they trailed 59-45 after three.
"We normally look for Aaron to put up points," Starks said. "So with him out, I knew I had to step my game up."
Starks shot the ball a hefty 34 times, making 12, including three 3-pointers. He was 6 of 6 from the line.
"Yeah, I'm tired," he said with a grin.
North Chicago had ample energy to start the final quarter, despite being down 14.
Starks hit back-to-back 3s and then sophomore call-up Pat Coleman, who didn't play in the first half, drained a 3 of his own. In just 47 seconds, the Warhawks had pulled within 59-54.
Smith, meanwhile, was playing despite having picked up his fourth foul in the first minute of the fourth.
"I really didn't expect to take a seat with it being the kind of game I knew it was going to be," Smith said. "I just knew, as a player, it's about basketball IQ. I knew I couldn't reach for silly fouls. I couldn't come up on anyone's back. They're little guys and I knew that they were going to get me for a charge sooner or later. I just kept my composure and tried not to speed with the basketball."
Zion-Benton needed its Ohio State-bound star because Starks and his teammates wouldn't go away. Smith scored 9 points in the fourth, hitting 5 of 6 free throws.
Not until Eric Pasiewicz hit 2 foul shots with 15.1 seconds left did Zion-Benton have any breathing room, at 79-73.
"It's a very difficult team to guard," Zion-Benton coach Don Kloth said of North Chicago. "If you play man, they'll penetrate on you. If you play a zone, they'll shoot 3s. So give a lot of credit to coach (Gerald) Coleman for what he's done. I think their kids, without their top player, just played as hard as you could expect."
The Zee-Bees' Cordaryus Craigen (15 points, 10 rebounds), Owen Worthington (12 points, 13 rebounds) and Dondre Osborne (11 points) supported Smith.
Besides Starks, Michael Simpson (14 points) scored in double figures for North Chicago, which trailed 36-28 at the half.
"I told them at halftime, 'You're doing a great job,' " Gerald Coleman said. "Starks picked it up and took over like (Aaron) Simpson would normally do. That's what got us in the first half. Simpson would have hit three or four 3s. We didn't have that, so we had to change our whole game. I wanted bigger people to try to fight them on the boards."