Kaneland 73, Geneva 71
In all the years Kaneland boys basketball coach Dennis Hansen has coached, he's never seen anything like Friday's game at Geneva.
His Knights were down early by as much as 26 points, but made an unbelievable comeback in their 73-71 win on Geneva's Senior Night.
"I've never been down that early (by) that much (and) make it a game, yet alone win the game," Hansen said. "To come back and make it a game was quite an accomplishment, but to come back and win was something I've never seen before. We settled down and played basketball."
"It's the greatest feeling in the world to beat Geneva," said Kaneland sophomore Dave Dudzinski, who finished with 14 points and 15 rebounds. "It's incredible."
At the start of the game, however, it was all the Vikings, as they led 29-3 after the first quarter. That included a 25-0 run, as senior Alex Turnowchyk scored 12 of his 20 total points in the opening quarter, and senior Max Cary scored 11 of his game-high 25 points.
Everything began to change in the second quarter, as the Knights capped the half on a 10-0 run and ended up outscoring Geneva 26-12. That reduced the Vikings' lead to 41-29 at the break.
"You saw a team that looked like they never played the game -- they looked like first-graders playing -- then all of the sudden, you saw a team that can play basketball," Hansen said. "I don't know how we did it, but we shouldn't have been in that situation."
"We never thought for a second at halftime we were going to lose this game," Dudzinski added.
A change in Kaneland's defense was the difference from the first to the second quarter, according to Geneva coach Tim Pease.
"Dennis went to a variation of zones to slow us down, spread us out and make us take contested shots," Pease said. "They did a real nice job of that. We didn't hit much. We wanted to get the ball inside, but (Dudzinski) did a nice job of -- if not blocking our shots -- altering our shots. I think his presence kept our perimeter players from throwing it in (the paint) from time to time."
The Knights picked up where they left off at the start of the second half by scoring the first 8 points of the third. A basket from Turnowchyk interrupted the 18-0 rally, but another 7 consecutive points gave Kaneland its first lead of the game, 44-43, at the 4:10 mark.
Kaneland finished the third quarter outscoring Geneva, 21-9.
The game was tied 4 times before Kaneland took the lead for good after a pair of Dudzinski's free throws with 50.6 seconds left in the game pushed the Knights ahead, 67-65.
Clutch free throws from Kevin Green and Wagner also iced the game for the Knights. Wagner finished with 14 points next to Green's 10- point effort. Mike Pritchard was a spark off the bench with his 9 points.
Geneva (14-11, 8-5), who beat the Knights earlier this season 65-63, also received a solid contribution from another senior, Chris Jordan. He finished with 13 points, 10 rebounds and 4 steals.