Wheaton North gains momentum

Wheaton North came into the 36th annual Elgin Holiday boys basketball tournament on a three-game slide.

Now the Falcons (6-4) are riding high into the tourney semifinals after a pair of close wins. On Tuesday night they held off a series of challenges from Buffalo Grove for a 66-61 victory at Chesbrough Fieldhouse.

“It definitely helps a lot confidence-wise because we've been kind of on and off as a team,” said Wheaton North senior Jeff Schalk, who came off the bench to score 15 points on 6-for-11 shooting. “This is the way we've been trying to do it all year, get back to basics and do everything we need to do.”

Six-foot-6 senior Nick Barry got 10 of his 12 points and 7 of his 10 rebounds after halftime and junior Sam Otto also came off the bench to score 11 points for the Falcons.

Now they get a shot in today's 8 p.m. semifinal at Neuqua Valley (11-0), which beat Fremd 71-61.

“We did a good job of holding our composure there in the last two minutes,” said Wheaton North coach Jim Nazos. “It's a great win for our kids.”

Wheaton North took its biggest lead at 37-25 on Otto's 3-pointer 2:26 after halftime. But Nazos never felt comfortable with the ability of BG (8-3) to quickly cut into the lead from behind the arc.

“They have a lot of guys who can make plays and hit some bombs to put them right back in the game,” Nazos said.

BG scoring leader Nick Prus scored all 9 of his points in the third quarter before fouling out with 5:48 to play. Sophomore Luke Potnick hit a pair of long fourth-quarter 3s and scored all 16 of his points in the second half and Sam Wacker finished with 14 points and 9 rebounds.

But 23 turnovers were part of the reason BG is playing at 5 p.m. today against Fremd.

“It's easy to play when you're playing well but you have to play through adversity,” said BG coach Ryan O'Connor. “I felt we didn't really unite as a team when things got adverse and hopefully it's a learning experience for us.

“Usually I talk about defense but we were really poor offensively. It was all 1-on-1 and Wheaton North had a lot to do with that. We need to do a better job of sharing the basketball.”

BG got within 2 points three times in the final two minutes — the last at 63-61 on Wacker's short baseline jumper with 40 seconds left.

Jordan Wayhart (9 points) hit 1 of 2 free throws four seconds later, the Falcons didn't allow a 3 attempt behind the arc and Mike Fitzpatrick sealed the win with 2 free throws at 0:17.

“The past two years we've struggled in this tournament and during the season,” Schalk said. “To play a team like Neuqua is huge for us.”