Miklasz, Hersey stop Lake Zurich

After hitting 10-of-15 shots in the Class 4A Warren regional 3-point shooting contest on Monday, long-range bomber Kyle Miklasz might have worried that he used all of his best stuff before tipoff.

He and his Hersey teammates were then scheduled to take on Lake Zurich in a first round IHSA state tournament play-in game.

It didn't take long, however, for Miklasz to realize that there were more 3-pointers where all those 3-pointers from the contest came from. Much more.

Miklasz ended up hitting not only from downtown but uptown and midtown, too, as he busted up Lake Zurich's zone defense and drained a career-high nine 3-pointers.

Throw in a single 2-point bucket and 3 free throws and Miklasz wound up with a career-high 32 points in leading 14th-seeded Hersey to a 66-52 victory over No. 20 Lake Zurich.

The victory moved Hersey (15-12) into today's regional semifinal at Warren against No. 4 Lake Forest and avenged a 58-55 loss at Lake Zurich on Feb. 6.

Lake Zurich ended its season at 3-24.

"Maybe the three-point contest did have something to do with it," said Miklasz, who had 17 points at halftime on five 3-pointers. "Maybe it's because I got some extra shots up before the game."

Whatever the reason, the Huskies aren't questioning it. Miklasz kept them in the game every step of the way, particularly in the first half when they were trailing by as many as five points.

He scored all 11 of their first-quarter points and had 2 big treys in the second quarter to help keep Hersey's halftime deficit to 28-25.

"He had a great shooting night, he just really got hot," Hersey coach Steve Messer said of Miklasz. "He made really good decisions with the ball."

Lake Zurich finally decided to take off the zone defense and throw a man-to-man at Miklasz in the third quarter. But by then, too much damage had been done.

Miklasz and teammates Vuk Vukovic and Trevor Haas opened the second half with four 3-pointers. That gave Hersey a 39-34 advantage and the lead for good.

"He's a very good shooter and he hurt us," Lake Zurich coach John Zarr said of Miklasz. "We didn't match up with him well at all. We just didn't have an answer for him."

Yet, Lake Zurich, which got a team-high 17 points from Marko Grcic and 12 points (on four 3-pointers) from Colin Rathe, was still very much in the game, even well into the fourth quarter. With about five minutes left, the Bears cut what had ballooned to a 12-point deficit down to just 50-45.

But then the Bears had to foul and Hersey closed by hitting 11 free throws.

"We had opportunities but then we started turning the ball over," Zarr said. "Up to that point, we hadn't turned the ball over very much. We had five at halftime, but eight in the second half and all at key stretches and that really hurt us."

For Hersey, Miklasz was the only player in double figures, but Tom Sutrinaitis finished with 9 points and Vukovic added eight.

Warren 62, Wheeling 33: At Warren, Craig Burton's 9 points led a balanced scoring attack, as the host Blue Devils won their 11th game in a row.

No. 12 Warren (14-10) will play No. 5 Stevenson in Wednesday's 7:30 p.m. regional semifinal.

Jeremiah Jackson and Shahron Thomas added 8 points apiece for Warren, which led 20-10 after one quarter and 39-17 at halftime.