Group effort powers Dundee-Crown
Ryan Smith's 3-pointer with 3:04 left in the game was responsible for giving Dundee-Crown the lead for good, but the Chargers' 50-43 victory over District 300 rival Jacobs in Wednesday's Class 4A Larkin regional semifinal was a team win, according to coach Lance Huber.
"We got contributions," Huber said of the 11 players who saw playing time for No. 3 Dundee-Crown (13-13). "In practice the other day we were talking about team and how together everybody achieves more. I thought tonight we played as a team. Everybody that came in didn't care what they did. That's why we won. They just wanted to win, and that's the most important thing."
After winning the rubber match against No. 2 Jacobs (16-13), the Chargers advance to the regional title game against top seed Elgin (21-5) on Friday at 7:30 p.m.
The game was a typically tight contest between D-C and the Golden Eagles. Neither team led by more than 7 points and the lead seesawed 10 times. The last lead change came courtesy of Smith's 3-pointer. The 6-foot-4 senior was wide open on the right edge of the arc, thanks to a screen, and his shot touched nothing but net.
"I just got it and felt it," said Smith, who led all scorers with 21 points to go with his 7 rebounds. "The whole night I thought we were running good offense. We had lots of different guys getting good looks."
The Golden Eagles simply couldn't score down the stretch. They notched their last field goal on a breakaway layup by Matt Ehrhardt with 4:04 to play, which at the time gave Jacobs a 41-39 lead.
In Jacobs' final 7 possessions following Smith's go-ahead shot, the Golden Eagles turned the ball over twice, missed 2 shots, drew 3 fouls and sank only 2-of-6 free throws. They shot 29 percent from the field (13 of 44) compared to 46 percent for the Chargers (15 of 33). D-C won the rebounding battle 35-22.
"We just couldn't get any stops, and then we couldn't put the ball in the hoop," said senior point guard Mike Peterson, who led Jacobs with 13 points. "It's as simple as that pretty much. We just couldn't knock down anything, then we'd foul them and they knocked down their free throws."
Only five players scored for D-C: Smith, senior Jamel Kimbrough (10 points, 13 rebounds), sophomores Dylan Kissack (10 points) and Brandon Rodriguez (3 points) and junior Thomas McNally (6 points).
But other contributions came from players like Will Cronin, who stripped the ball from Jacobs guard Nick Hofman with a minute left in the game. Hofman was held to 11 points, 7 below his season average, and fouled out with 49 seconds left.
"Seniors usually carry you at the end and they did tonight at the end of the ballgame," Huber said.