Richmond, Waukegan roll over Rolling Meadows
The first half was winding down and Rolling Meadows was even with Jereme Richmond in Tuesday night's Buffalo Grove Class 4A boys basketball regional semifinal.
That was a big problem for the 17th-seeded Mustangs in their shot at Waukegan, the sectional's top seed and top-ranked 4A team by The Associated Press.
The 6-foot-7 Richmond scored 21 of his game-high 30 points before halftime and Waukegan (22-4) rolled on with a 90-60 win over the Mustangs (10-18).
"Richmond, he's a freak," said Meadows sophomore point guard Brian Nelms, who had 8 points and 3 assists. "If he wants to he can just take over at any time."
The Illinois-bound Richmond hit 14 of 19 shots, had 10 rebounds and blocked 2 shots before coming out with about seven minutes left as the Bulldogs advanced to Friday's 7:30 p.m. regional final against No. 9 BG (17-10), a 56-53 winner over Conant.
Aaron Johnson had 16 points and Akeem Springs added 14 as the Bulldogs shot 60.6 percent (40-for-66) and turned 25 turnovers into 26 points.
"We felt we had mismatches all over the floor," Richmond said. "They opened in a man-to-man and we wanted to exploit that a little bit."
Meadows trailed 11-8 as Richie Kemph (25 points on 11-for-24 shooting) and Nelms hit 3-pointers and some nice passing led to Tyler Allen finding Jimmy Garoppolo (11 points, 6 rebounds) for a layup. But Kemph's baseline reverse was Meadows' only response as Waukegan raced to a 30-10 lead.
"They were up-and-down the floor before we were even down there," Kemph said after ending his stellar three-year career with more than 1,000 points. "It was bad.
"They were very athletic and that's what killed us. Rebounding they could jump out of the gym. We thought we could've gotten in Richmond's head a little bit -"
Sophomore Tyler Gaedele added 8 points as Meadows kept battling even though Richmond had 4 dunks.
"I'm proud of the fact we never quit and kept playing and kept battling hard," said Meadows coach Kevin Katovich.
"I'd rather play them and lose to them," Kemph said. "I'd rather play the best team."