Boys basketball: Naperville North ends Geneva’s unbeaten season, reaches Hinkle title game
A trip to the championship game of the 24th annual Hinkle Holiday Classic boys basketball tournament was on the line Tuesday night when Naperville North met Geneva in the semifinals.
The game was close early on as the Huskies held a 9-8 lead after one quarter. But the Vikings were unable to keep Naperville North from building its biggest lead of the game at 27-19 at halftime.
The Huskies (12-2) extended that lead to 42-31 before they knocked Geneva (10-1) out of its undefeated status with a 56-45 victory.
Naperville North will play defending Class 4A state champion Benet Academy for the championship Friday at 7:30 p.m.
The Huskies really got rolling in the third quarter as a 3-pointer by junior Jack Zitko gave them a commanding 41-25 lead with less than three minutes left in the period.
Geneva trailed by 11 entering the fourth quarter before junior Ben Peterson (8 points) cut the lead to 42-33 with 6:43 to play. But that was as close as the Vikings would get as a 3-pointer by Zitko (15 points) and a 3-pointer by senior Miles Okyne (game-high 18 points, 8 rebounds) boosted the lead to 48-33 with less than six minutes remaining.
"We feel fortunate to have won. Geneva is an outstanding team and program, and getting second-chance points helped us," said Naperville North coach Gene Nolan, whose team outrebounded Geneva 36-19. "Miles (Okyne) played really well at both ends of the floor, and he had a great overall game."
The Vikings put together a late rally as an inside basket by Peterson cut the gap to 53-45 with 44 seconds to play. But Okyne was 4-for-4 at the free throw line in the final 18 seconds to seal the victory.
"It was great. We had the guys hit the shots they were supposed to hit so that was huge for us," said Okyne, who knows his squad has a huge test Friday.
"I've got a couple of friends on Benet and they're coming off a state championship so it's going to be tough."
Senior Carson Loughlin had 11 points and 8 rebounds for the Huskies while senior teammate Will Harvey grabbed 12 rebounds. Max Steele had 5 rebounds.
Senior Nathan Palmer scored a team-high 16 points for Geneva. Freshman teammate Cody Rader came off the bench to score 12 points.
"Naperville North is really good, they're in first place in their league, and Gene is an unbelievable coach," said Geneva coach Scott Hennig, whose team will play Barrington for third place on Friday.
"We lost the turnover and rebound battle, and they had that spell in the second half where they built the lead up to 16."
The tourney honors long-time Jacobs Hall of Fame coach Jim Hinkle, who retired after the 2012-13 season. Hinkle also coached at Crown, where he guided his 1980-81 team to a 26-2 record which included a 25-game winning streak.