Carmel doubles up Elmwood Park
It's a good trivia question.
Name the three Carmel players who outscored Elmwood Park's boys basketball team in the third quarter of its own Class 3A regional title game Friday night.
Answer one: Kimahri Wilson. He had a pair of 3-pointers in the quarter.
Answer two: Damone Williams-Gray. He scored inside.
Answer three: Johnny Roeser. He scored the final two baskets of the quarter.
Carmel (22-11) doubled up Elmwood Park by halftime, 28-14.
Carmel then outscored the Tigers 25-4 in the third quarter to put the game on ice. Carmel again won easily, 60-30, to advance to the Grayslake Central sectional and face DePaul Prep at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday. St. Viator will take on St. Patrick in the opener at 6 p.m. in a sectional featuring three East Suburban Catholic Conference teams.
"We were up by 14 at halftime,'' said Williams-Gray. "Coach told us to not let up and eventually, they would fold. They were not a bad team. But they didn't have much height."
Williams-Gray had 6 points in the third quarter rush. Wilson had 8 and Roeser had 7.
Wilson led all scorers with 19 points. Despite being under 6 feet tall, he notched 7 rebounds.
"We wanted to do this for the seniors,'' Wilson said. "It was their last game in this gym."
The first quarter found both teams struggling to score. It was tied at 7-7 before Wilson's first 3-pointer beat the buzzer.
Halfway through the third quarter, Wilson finally caught the Tigers. His 3-pointer tied the Tigers, 16-16. At this point the Carmel lead was 41-16.
It was 53-16 after three quarters.
"We really locked it up on defense in that third quarter,'' said Carmel coach Zack Ryan. "We speeded the game up and got some fastbreak baskets."
The Tigers rallied for a decent fourth quarter. Joey Halaburt came off the bench to land a 3-pointer in the final quarter.
Williams-Gray added 15 points to the Carmel attack. Roeser finished with 10 points.