Jacobs tournament roundup

His team wasn't scoring, nor responding well to its noon tipoff against Wauconda, so during a late third-quarter timeout, coach Tom Poulin pulled four of his St. Charles North players.

The guy he left in the basketball game was the one playing ... defense.

Take a bow, Beau Blakeley.

"We were playing a little too relaxed," said Blakeley, a senior guard. "I was trying to do what I could defensively, trying to get after the ball a little bit."

Blakeley did, validating Poulin's decision to leave him on the court by finishing with 4 steals to go along with 9 points, as St. Charles pulled away to win 58-47 Monday and improve to 2-0 in the Jacobs Holiday Classic in Algonquin.

"We just got to get after it more on the defensive end," Blakeley said. "We can't let a team like that hang around with us."

While St. Charles North, the tournament runner-up the last two years, improved to 7-5, Wauconda fell to 3-8 (0-2 at Jacobs) with its fifth straight loss. The Bulldogs committed 18 turnovers.

"We've been starting off real slow in this tournament," said forward Eric Hartnett, who led Wauconda with a game-high 18 points, despite getting a bloody nose thanks to an errant elbow. "I guess in that fourth quarter it started to slip away. Turnovers have been our big thing these past two years. We've probably been (averaging) upward of 20 turnovers per game and that's just not where we need to be."

A Jeremy Powell layup in transition off a missed North Stars free throw had Wauconda within 31-28 with a minute to go in the third quarter. But after Poulin's pep talk, Ryan Brown put back his own miss to put St. Charles up 33-28 entering the fourth.

The North Stars then opened the fourth with a layup by Josh Mikes (team-high 13 points) and a steal and layup by Chris Conrad. The lead eventually swelled to 15 points on another Brown basket, capping a 20-8 run.

"I thought that was the one stretch in the game where we played with some passion," Poulin said. "I guess it's somewhat understandable after a day off, on a Monday morning, to come out here and kind of have a low-energy level. But at some point somebody on the team has to wake you up. It can't always be the coach.

"We were looking for some guys to step up and say, 'That's not what St. Charles North basketball is all about.' "

Kyle Nelson added 10 points and 10 rebounds for the North Stars. Brown and Scott Hedges came off the bench to add 7 and 6 points, respectively.

The North Stars' reserves have played well in the first two games of the tournament.

"I like the fact that our bench is really contributing," Poulin said. "Our bench is stepping up and giving us some energy and solid minutes."

Sophomore guard Kyle Ryan added 12 points for Wauconda, sinking two 3-pointers.

"Offensively, we were rushing things a little bit," Bulldogs coach Scott Luetschwager said.

"We weren't getting quite to the spots we needed to be."

Prairie Ridge 74, St. Edward 64: After a 27-point loss to St. Charles North on Saturday, it looked as if St. Edward would rebound nicely with an impressive 26-15 first-quarter explosion against Prairie Ridge Monday at the Jacobs Holiday Classic., in the 2009 Jacobs Holiday Classic on Monday.

St. Edward (5-6) went lights out, hitting 9 of 12 shots, including four 3-pointers, one from Mike Ellis who had 11 first-quarter points. But, at some point, you'd figure Corky Card's team defense would step up.

"We gave up 26 points in the 1st quarter. I didn't even know that was possible till I saw it," Card said. "Right now we're just trying to pressure the ball enough to give ourselves times to catch up."

Card was right. Not only did the Wolves (5-5) pressure the life out of the Green Wave, St. Edward committed 25 turnovers and took just 24 shots from the second quarter on. The Wolves outscored the Green Wave 59-38 and Chad Ljunggren's 34-point effort gave PR more than enough to come out with a 74-64 win.

"We trapped them well," said Ljunggren. "I think we matched up with them on our press well."

Trailing 29-17 with 7:27 in the second quarter, the Wolves' press began clicking, sparking a 23-7 run to halftime. Ljunggren, who had 7 steals, hit a 3-pointer and scored 2 consecutive layups, which cut the deficit to 5. He rattled off a couple thefts and fast break layups to give PR a 35-34 lead with less than 2 minutes to go in the half. Ljunggren nailed a 3-pointer before the half, and erased an 11-point Wave lead with his own 16-point quarter. Incredibly, St. Edward shot 11-for-19 in the half, but only attempted 7 shots and was outscored 25-10 in the second quarter to trail 40-36 at the half.

"We've had problems like that. We've had very good first quarters this year, and all of a sudden, we get a little impatient. They had us rushing our shots," Green Wave coach Keith Chuipek said.

The Green Wave couldn't do the same to Prairie Ridge, as the Wolves shot 56 percent from the field and kept going to the press which forced 13 second-half turnovers.

Seven 3-pointers kept St. Edward alive. DJ Byrnes (13 points) nailed one with 2 minutes remaining in the third, cutting the lead to 47-44. Prairie Ridge outscored the Wave 27-20 in the last 9 minutes and timely turnovers took their toll. Ljunggren put the game away for good on his fifth 3-pointer with under 6 minutes remaining, giving the Wolves a 57-46 lead. He scored 9 points in the fourth quarter and added 5 rebounds.

Jacobs 60, CL Central 59: The Jacobs boys basketball team just keeps finding ways to win games at its own Jacobs Holiday Classic.

The Golden Eagles overcame a 5-point deficit with 5 minutes remaining Monday night and rallied past Crystal Lake Central, 60-59.

"We really stiffened up our defense and didn't give up anything," Jacobs coach Jim Hinkle said. "That kept us in the game to where we were able to put up some good shots and run our offense."

Jacobs is 2-0 in Pool I play and will play Barrington, which also is 2-0, at 7:30 p.m. today with the winner advancing to the championship bracket. The Golden Eagles (2-6) have won the tournament the last three seasons.

"So far we're doing all we can and playing our best," Jacobs junior Nick Hofman said. "Hopefully we can come out (today) and win our pool."

The Golden Eagles jumped out to a 11-2 lead behind 5 points from Matt Schmidt and 4 from Mike Peterson. They led 15-6 with 3 minutes left in the first quarter before the Tigers (1-9) went on a 13-0 run to take a 19-15 lead 20 seconds into the second quarter.

The game went back-and-forth the rest of the way with Jacobs leading by no more than 4 points and CL Central leading by 5, 51-46, with 5:15 left in the fourth quarter after John Nemcek's 3-pointer.

Hofman hit a pair of free throws with 3:32 left to tie the game at 53-53. The junior guard then found Peterson underneath for an easy layup with 2:57 left to give the Golden Eagles a 55-53 lead, the 10th and final lead change.

Hofman scored 9 points in the fourth, including going 5-for-5 from the foul line.

"I've always like that, always want the ball in my hands, so I will be able to do something with it," said Hofman, who finished with a game-high 18 points and went 9-for-10 from the free-throw line.

The Tigers' Michael Fior hit a 3-pointer with 3 seconds left to make it 60-59, but CL Central was out of timeouts to stop the clock and the Golden Eagles did not need to inbound the ball.

Schmidt finished with 14 points and 6 rebounds for Jacobs. Sean Meyer added 10 points.

Jake Chrystal led the Tigers with 12 points. Nemcek and Fior finished with 10 points each.

"We're really focused on trying to get a little better every game," Tigers coach Rich Czeslawski said. "I thought we took a step tonight that was pretty important."

Bartlett 66, Cary-Grove 53: Bartlett's depth was too much for Cary-Grove. Twelve different players scored as the Hawks downed the Trojans, 66-53, in pool play at the Jacobs Holiday Classic Monday.

Chad McCarron had 27 points and 15 rebounds for Cary-Grove, but the Hawks kept players coming in waves.

Luke Labedzki led the way with 13 points for Bartlett. Mike Banks added 10 points and Femi Oyewale and Larry Whitaker added 8 points apiece for the Hawks, who got 38 points from their bench.

"When you play 3, 4, 5 games in a short span you've got to get into your bench, otherwise your guys really get tired," said Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith. "Our bench is solid. I like my bench. I'll go 12, 13 deep. I like my guys down there."

Banks scored twice as the Hawks (7-3) opened up a 9-0 lead. After Cary closed the gap to 9-6, Bartlett went on a 15-2 run to blow the game open. The Hawks led 31-14 at halftime as the Trojans shot just 20 percent.

"For some reason we weren't ready to play," said Cary coach Ralph Schuetzle. "We missed a lot of shots right around the hole, we played tentative handling the ball. We just weren't very aware of our surroundings."

The Trojans came out stronger after the break. They opened the second half with an 8-2 run to make it 33-22, but that was as close as they got.

In contrast to Bartlett, McCarron was a one-man wrecking crew for Cary-Grove. The senior scored 19 points in the second half to keep the Trojans within striking distance.

Matt Aulert added 7 points, and Ryan Barker had 7 rebounds and 6 points for Cary-Grove (3-6).

Joe Aguilar, Steve Nichols, Allen Oshinski and Brian Schaumburg contributed