Boys basketball: Lifton, Prospect shoot past Lake Zurich in 4th quarter
Ryan Lifton heated up and lifted Prospect Tuesday night in Lake Zurich.
The senior scored all of his 10 points in the fourth quarter as the Knights rallied and then pulled away from Lake Zurich 49-38.
“I realized I wasn’t playing my best and I knew I had to turn it up in the fourth quarter,” said Lifton, who made a pair of three-pointers and all four of his free throws in the final period.
“I didn’t want us to go 1-3 to start the season. My shots weren’t falling early and I knew I had to get that out of my head.”
With Lifton leading the way, Prospect (2-2) knocked down all six of its shots in the final quarter as the Knights rallied from a 33-32 deficit.
“That is kind of basketball,” Prospect coach Brad Rathe said. “Sometimes shots go in and sometimes they don’t. We knocked down some open ones. I thought we got the ball into the right positions and had guys in the right spots. We just didn’t hit anything in the third quarter.”
With Ben Schneider back on the court for the Knights after missing nearly all of last season with a knee injury, Prospect got off to a good start. Schneider, who was directing most of the Knights offense through him, scored 10 of his 12 points in the first half.
His play enabled Prospect to close out the first half on a 7-2 run and take a 24-17 halftime lead.
Lake Zurich (2-3) had rallied from that halftime deficit to tie the game at 30-30 at the end of the third quarter on a free throw by Evan Peterson. But the Bears shot poorly all evening, going 0 for 17 from outside the arc and just 12 of 23 from the free-throw line.
“We have to make free throws and we have to shoot the ball better,” Lake Zurich coach Terry Coughlin said. “If you can’t do that, it is hard to win. You have to put the round ball in the basket. We played hard. We just need to play with more attention to details and we have to finish.”
Prospect also struggled with its shooting, especially in the third quarter. The Knights converted just 2 of 8 with 5 turnovers.
But that changed in the fourth quarter.
Schneider able to break away from traps and find open men. The senior was able to get the ball to Lifton, Colin Tucker (7 points) and Jack Skoog (6 points) as Prospect went on a 13-1 run to open up a 45-34 lead with 2:43 to play.
“I just have to look to kick out to my open teammates,” Schneider said. “They were playing hard defense on me and I knew I had to trust my teammates tonight and they were hitting shots.”
Rathe said he loved his team’s energy after going 1-2 at the St. Viator tournament.
“I thought we played so hard tonight,” Rathe said. “I told my guys we are looking for guys to compete. We went out and did and we played hard from the start. I am proud of our effort.”
Danny Simon had 6 points for Prospect while Connor Straus led Lake Zurich with 16 points. Peterson added 7 points while Kain Kretschmar added 5 points.