Myjak a bright spot for St. Viator

If a silver lining can come out of a loss, then St.Viator's boys basketball team found it.

Junior Chris Myjak scored 25 points and pulled down 8 rebounds in the Lions 68-59 loss to Notre Dame in Niles Friday night.

But the Dons were dialing from long distance in hitting 10-of-15 attempts from 3-point range as they improved to 17-3 overall and 6-2 in the East Suburban Catholic Conference.

"Chris played well tonight," said Lions coach Joe Majkowski. "We've been looking for that type of game with him. I was pleased with our overall team effort. We had a few breakdowns that hurt and we didn't guard the premiter as well as we did in practice."

"I was more agressive from the start," said Myjak. "I haven't had a great offensive year. What I need to do the rest of the season is to come out aggressive like I did tonight."

The Lions (12-7, 4-4) pulled out to a 28-16 lead with 3:02 left in the first half.

Myjak and Kevin Walsh (19 points, 7 rebounds) each scored 6 points in a 12-4 run.

Junior guard Greg Leifel got the Dons back into the game by hitting three straight 3s. That pulled Notre Dame to within 28-25 at halftime.

Leifel hit five 3s to account for all of his points.

"I've been waiting for a day like this," said Leifel. "The coaches know I'm a good shooter. I think it carried us over into the second half."

Quinton Chievous scored all 15 Notre Dame points in the third quarter but the Lions scored two more and led 45-40 going into the fourth.

Chievous (26 points) put Notre Dame ahead for good at 55-54 with 2:28 left in the game. Leifel applied the back breaker with a baseline 3 for a 63-57 lead with 1:00 left.

The Dons' Rodney Pryor did a lot of fourth-quarter damage, scoring 12 of his 17 points. They also hit 5-of-7 free throws down the stretrch.