Boys basketball: Stevenson stymies South Elgin

With Stevenson in its green uniforms and South Elgin wearing red, it was a Christmas-like atmosphere Wednesday night when the two squads met in a nonconference boys basketball game in Lincolnshire.

The Patriots, who rolled to a 75-33 victory, fired on all cylinders right from the opening tip despite the Storm still staying within striking distance by trailing 18-10 after one quarter.

But it was all downhill for South Elgin (3-7) after that as Stevenson overwhelmed them by outscoring them 26-9 in the second quarter to take a commanding 44-19 lead into halftime.

The Patriots (6-2) kept that momentum going into the third quarter as they outscored South Elgin 24-5 before rolling to an easy victory as the entire fourth quarter was played with a running clock.

Stevenson got everyone involved offensively in the first half as seniors Donny Williams and Rocco Pagliocca (4 assists) both scored 12 of their team-high 16 points before the intermission to put the Storm in a major deficit.

“We played really well as a team tonight, so far during the season we kind of struggled in the second and third quarters so we really made that our emphasis,” said Williams, who also had 6 rebounds, 4 assists, and 3 steals. “We made sure to take out one of their best shooters of the game, No. 21 (Aman Chiluka), who shoots 3's and he finished the game with zero points, so that was a very good job by the team to make sure to switch and talk on the screens.”

The Pats put the game away in the third quarter as a 3-point play by sophomore Max Dabbs (5 points) gave them their biggest lead at 66-22 late in the period.

Junior Cohen Ottaviano (2 steals) had 7 of his 9 points in the first half as Stevenson had five different players hit 3-pointers in the first half. Senior Aidan Albrecht had 7 points, 6 rebounds, and 4 assists while teammate Karthik Krishnarajah had 8 points off the bench. The Patriots were also a perfect 13 of 13 from the free-throw line.

“I thought that we shared the ball well and we've gotten more consistent the last six days sharing the ball,” said Stevenson coach Will Benson, whose team plays Friday at McHenry. “And then I thought we executed really well defensively tonight and we rebounded really well. When we kind of got the lead going we just talked about continuing to stack together good possessions because it can get sloppy if you lose focus.”

South Elgin junior Massimo Nalbono scored 6 of his 8 points in the first half before leaving the game with a foot injury in the third quarter. The Storm got 6 points and 4 rebounds from Anthony Plaza while teammate Kyle Mann had 6 points and 3 rebounds. South Elgin also got 5 points from junior Charlie Nissen as the Pats were outscored 9-7 in the fourth quarter.