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Boys basketball: Waubonsie battles past Barrington, earns spot in Hinkle title game

Waubonsie Valley has delivered a lot of early knockouts the last two seasons.

Barrington refused to go down without a fight in Thursday night’s second semifinal of Jacobs’ Hinkle Holiday Classic in Algonquin.

But the top-seeded and defending champion Warriors showed they can go the distance. Illinois State-bound guard Tyreek Coleman scored a game-high 26 points and they answered every challenge in a 66-59 victory.

“When things aren’t going their way and it looks bleak they still think they’re going to win,” said Waubonsie coach Andrew Schweitzer after his team converted 15 turnovers into 26 points.

“With this team what’s a little bit different is the energy we play with,” said Coleman, who was 10-for-12 from the field and had 5 rebounds and 3 assists. “Last year we had some guys who would get down at some points but not this team. We have the same energy through the highs and lows. We’ve got a lot of fighters.”

Two big ones for the Warriors (11-0) were senior guard Josh Tinney (16 points) and sophomore swingman Kris Mporokoso (15 points, three 3-pointers) as they moved into today’s 7:30 p.m. title game. They’ll try to join the Jacobs teams of 2006-08 and 2016-17 as the tourney’s only repeat champs against No. 3 Crystal Lake South (11-1), a 64-30 semifinal winner over Grayslake Central.

Barrington (6-4) fell behind 9-0 and 22-7 but kept counterpunching with junior Oliver Gray (21 points) and senior Chris Tacher (20 points, 7 rebounds). Waubonsie kept Gray quiet for three quarters as he missed his first seven 3s but he hit five in a row in the fourth and then found Tacher for another 3 to cut the deficit to 63-59 with 19 seconds left.

“We knew Waubonsie Valley was a very talented team coming in and we had to make sure to be ready for the haymakers if they came to us,” Tacher said after shooting 8-for-16. “We stayed ready and knew we could respond well. Coach (Bryan) Tucker did a great job of preparing us in a short period of time.”

Barrington, which plays Grayslake Central for third at 6 p.m., also got some big first-half minutes off the bench from Danny Shackleton (7 points, 4 assists) and Adam Baird had 4 second-half assists.

“It’s tough to face that kind of pressure any time, but especially with two days with no practice and the holiday,” Tucker said. “I liked how our guys settled down and fought back. They did a nice job and obviously they’re a really talented team.”

And one that has a lot of options to respond beyond Coleman and 6-5 Moses Wilson (4 points, 8 rebounds).

“There are possessions where we play beautiful basketball and I don’t touch the ball,” Coleman said. “That’s fine with me as long as we’re getting out with a victory.”

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