South Elgin overcomes 16-point deficit to deny St. Charles North
Drake Montgomery had the ball in his hands at the right time.
Basketball can be the most capricious of sports.
In a boys nonconference outing Saturday afternoon at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates, South Elgin had a 28-point swing against St. Charles North.
But, almost miraculously, the North Stars were still in the game after Luke Scheffers' second 3-pointer in the waning moments sliced the South Elgin lead in half.
Montgomery, however, would have a 3-point possession of his own to answer Scheffers.
The 6-foot-3 senior guard, after South Elgin ran considerable clock after Scheffers' score with one minute and 17 seconds to play, converted a 3-point play.
It was the final points of the game as South Elgin claimed a 57-51 victory.
"Late in the game you want to put pressure on their defense, especially in a situation like that," said Montgomery, one of three players who tied for game-high scoring honors with 17 points. "I saw a lane to go into, and (the shot) went in. Our intensity turned it around for us."
St. Charles North (4-5) appeared to jettison its hard-luck triple-overtime loss against Lake Park Friday night by scoring 28 of the first 40 points of the game.
Christian Czerniak had a twisting reverse layup at the first-quarter buzzer for St. Charles North; the North Stars' Colin Nelson then hit back-to-back 3-pointers in the second as part of an 8-point personal run to give the North Stars a 28-12 lead.
"I really liked the first quarter and a half," St. Charles North coach Tom Poulin said. "We started to play the game the way we're supposed to play it."
But the Storm (9-1) would dominate the play through the following two-plus quarters, using a 40-12 run in the process to completely reverse its fortunes.
Montgomery capped a 14-2 second-quarter-closing burst to bring South Elgin to within 30-26 at the break.
"We had some key shots by some key players," said South Elgin post Vince Miszkiewicz, who was a central storyline after halftime.
Miszkiewicz matched the 17 points Montgomery scored for South Elgin as the duo combined for 19 of the 40 South Elgin points during the telltale run that tuned a double-digit deficit into a 52-40 lead early in the fourth.
Miszkiewicz had a gorgeous 12-foot baseline turnaround jumper and pull-up jumper on back-to-back early fourth-quarter possessions to stamp the Storm run.
"We had to shut them down, then we were able to run the ball and play our brand of basketball," Miszkiewicz said.
Alex Errington had all 8 of his points for South Elgin after halftime.
Lucas Heflen had 17 points to lead the North Stars; Nelson finished with 11.
"We're very consistent with being inconsistent," Poulin said. "We don't stick with how we want to play."