Record performance Seals it for Dundee-Crown

Senior Kiwaun "Kiwi" Seals delivered the greatest scoring performance in Dundee-Crown's 31-year history in a 50-48 victory over Cary-Grove in Carpentersville on Tuesday.

Seals scored 42 points, capped by the game-winning free throws with 2.2 seconds to play, eclipsing the previous school record of 37 points set by 2000 graduate Mike McKibben in a game against Lake Zurich.

"Before the game coach (Lance Huber) just always talks about playing in the flow of the offense and everything," said Seals, whose previous career high was 27. "A lot of shots just came in the course of the game. I got a couple of open shots I had to make. He got on me early, though, about jump stopping and pump faking so I could make a couple of more layups, but that's pretty much it."

Seals also shattered the record for consecutive points scored by a D-C player. After freshman teammate Jack Orndahl splashed a 3-pointer for the Chargers' first points, Seals scored the next 36 points for his team, more than doubling the previous record of 17 straight points held by Ryan Ewert.

However, Dundee-Crown (5-8, 1-1) trailed by 5 points with 1:40 left until Seals scored on an inside jumpshot and senior guard Caleb Parson sank a 3-pointer from the right wing with 40 seconds left to tie the game 48-48.

"Coach tells me if I'm open, shoot it," Parson said. "I've been making them. I didn't' make them all this game, but I made the one I needed."

Cary-Grove (8-5, 1-1) had possession with a chance to win, but senior Jason Gregoire (21 points) took a contested outside shot with 10 seconds left that wouldn't go. Seals got the defensive rebound and began to race up the court with time ticking away, but he was fouled at midcourt. He went to the line and canned both free throws for the winning points.

Cary-Grove was unable to get off a desperation attempt at the buzzer.

"We weren't strong enough with the ball and we weren't smart enough with the ball. That's why we lost the game," Cary-Grove coach Ralph Schuetzle said. "With a minute and a half to go, you've got to take wide-open layups, not pressured layups. We should have turned it into a free-throw contest and we didn't. We deserve to lose."

Seals made 16 of 28 attempts from the field and sank 10 of 11 free-throw attempts. He scored 84 percent of D-C's points.

"To be honest with you I had no idea," Huber said of Seals' record-breaking point total. "I mean, I thought he had 20, 25. I knew he had a lot of points. He always has a lot of points for us. I had no idea it was that many ... Everybody's going to talk about his points, but we've really been working hard on him to do it on both ends of the floor and he made some selfless plays tonight and I'm really proud of him for that."