Rout is Metea Valley's answer to first defeat
It wasn't St. Charles North's fault Metea Valley lost its first boys basketball game of the season earlier this week, but Metea made the North Stars pay nonetheless.
In the first quarter on Saturday in Aurora, Metea made 10 of 13 shots from the field and forced 11 turnovers to grab a 28-5 lead.
The teams played basically even after that but the damage had been done. With a 70-54 win in the Upstate Eight Conference crossover game, Metea (15-1) shelved doubts from Wednesday's overtime loss to Waubonsie Valley.
"We were looking to bounce back definitely after that loss, came out with a lot of energy and a little bit of anger, actually," said Metea guard Kenny Obendorf, who scored 16 points. "We were just able to pick it up on defense, get a lot of stops. We were able to go when we had numbers and otherwise we executed really well."
Mustangs forward Sean Davis said coach Bob Vozza even drew on how Metea's 2011 playoff loss to Bolingbrook helped translate to last summer's 34-4 record.
"He brought that up, like how we got after it," said Davis, who scored 7 points with 9 rebounds.
"He said: 'This is our first loss, how are we going to respond from it? Are we going to take the hit or are we going to go back and punch somebody in the face?'"
St. Charles North (7-12) started nicely enough, Tony Neari's inbounds pass targeting Quinten Payne for a two-handed slam. Kyle Nelson, the 6-foot-8 center, narrowed Metea's lead to 5-4. The North Stars missed their next seven tries.
Metea almost couldn't miss, hitting its first five. Davis, Obendorf, Milan Bojanic and Ryan Solomon who swished a pair of 3s and scored 11 of his game-high 24 points in the first quarter keyed a 23-0 run.
"It stinks," said Nelson, who tallied team highs of 16 points, 12 rebounds. "It's kind of like a blow to our manhood almost, to just come out and play with no competitiveness like that, just play weak and soft. It wasn't fun."
Down 28-5, what could St. Charles North coach Tom Poulin say?
"It's absolutely nothing different from what we told them when it was 0-0," he said. "We need to string stops together and win the battle on the boards and we'll be OK, and take care of the basketball."
The North Starts did a decent job of all of the above; still the hole was too deep. Payne finished with 14 points and Nelson started to deal inside, but the closest margin Metea allowed after its 39-21 halftime lead was 13 points.
"You're anxious a little bit," Vozza said of the Mustangs' post-Waubonsie scenario. "I tended to think they were going to respond this way."