Aurora Christian surges past St. Edward
On a night of general evenness between the two teams, the period of the contest that separated Aurora Christian's boys basketball team from St. Edward was the start of the second half.
Leading 31-29, the Eagles surged to open the third quarter, took the lead to 9 points in one surge, then surged again to claim a 49-33 edge that propelled the hosts to a 64-58 win in a Burney Wilkie Classic contest.
"We told them at halftime that they just had to get after it," Aurora Christian coach Pat McNamara said. "They did a good job. Pat (McNamara), Jake (Wolfe) and R.D. (Lutze) scored in bunches."
McNamara, the coach's son, scored 5 points, Wolfe added 7 and Lutze scored 5 in a third quarter in which the Eagles outscored St. Edward 21-13. While Aurora Christian surged, the Green Wave (4-3) struggled.
Through the rally, Aurora Christian (2-1) moved the basketball more fluidly than it had in the first half. Running the fast break from its set offense, the Eagles passed effectively, which contributed to their 9 of 13 third-quarter shooting.
"We've really got three point guards," McNamara said. "Jake Wolfe was a 5-11 point guard and now he's a 6-3 point guard. Jeremiah Wright handles the ball and (McNamara's) a backup for those guys. We should be able to pass."
The victory, however, was in doubt until the final moments of the game. St. Edward rallied in the fourth quarter and cut the lead to 60-54 with 1:12 to play on an Adam Radcliffe basket.
"They out-hustled us a little bit," St. Edward coach P.J. White said. "We called a timeout and probably should have called another one to get our kids to slow down. They were hitting 3s and we were trying to run and shoot, and when we missed those shots, we were further in the hole."
Strong free throw shooting allowed the Eagles (2-1) to secure the win. McNamara finished the contest with 20 points while Wolfe added 18 and Lutze scored 16 points and added 6 rebounds.
St. Edward guard Kelvin Cortez-Harvey led all scorers with 22 points. But while Cortez-Harvey did not score in the fourth quarter, Radcliffe and Andrew O'Neill sparked the rally. Radcliffe scored 9 of his 18 points in the fourth quarter and O'Neill scored 5 of his 12 points and grabbed 3 of his 7 rebounds in that quarter.
"What we said was that we didn't lose our composure," White said. "We've just got to do a little better with it. We don't have a lot of experience on the floor, and we need some floor generals to slow us down. We didn't do that for a short period of time, and that hurt us."