Zellis looms large as Wheaton North tops Rolling Meadows

As far as debuts go, Andrew Zellis was pretty satisfied with how his varsity game went, though he said he wasn’t pleased with a lapse in production in the third quarter.

Zellis did more than enough, however, pouring in a game-high 22 points to go along with 11 rebounds in leading Wheaton North (1-0) to a 50-40 victory over Rolling Meadows (0-1) in the Ed Molitor Thanksgiving Classic at Palatine High School.

“He has worked really hard over the last year and has improved tremendously,” said Wheaton North coach Jim Nazos. “It was an impressive first game. I think he did a great job of finishing, and our perimeter players did a great job of getting him the ball.”

With Rolling Meadows’ tallest starter being 6-foot-3, the 6-11 junior took advantage by scoring on an array of layups, putbacks and 10-foot jump shots.

Unselfish teammates such as Sam Otto (7 assists) and Ryan Jordan (4 assists) continually found Zellis down low for easy baskets.

“When we see a team with not as much height, we are going to look for Zellis a lot to open up our outside game and get him a bunch of points,” Otto said.

“We need him to score 20 points a game and I don’t think anyone can stop him.”

Zellis credited playing a summer of AAU ball to help ease the transition from the sophomore team to the varsity.

“It’s my first year but I don’t really feel like a rookie because I had a good summer of preparation,” Zellis said.

Tied 11-11 after the first quarter, the Falcons outscored the Mustangs 18-6 in the second quarter to open up the game.

“We stayed with what we were doing,” Nazos said. “We weren’t turning the ball over as much as we did in the first quarter. I thought we did a good job getting out to their shooters and at least altering their shots a little bit.”

Otto and Dan Madhavapallil made things difficult for the Mustangs’ top scoring threats as the duo combined to hold Tyler Gaedele and Brian Nelms to 11 points apiece.

“Gaedele is a kid that can make any shot and we didn’t want to give him any room whatsoever,” Otto said. “We had to tag him and make sure we were tight on him the whole game.”

When Gaedele found Michael Rose (10 points) for a layup, Rolling Meadows trailed just 40-36 with 2:48 to go.

But Madhavapallil knocked down a 3-pointer and Zellis scored on three consecutive trips to thwart any chances of a comeback.

“I thought we did a better job defensively in the second half, but the whole game we had way too many turnovers,” said Rolling Meadows coach Kevin Katovich. “That’s not something that I would expect from this group. We’ll have to get it right and come back tomorrow.”