Bartlett slips past Crystal Lake South
After dropping all 3 games in pool play, the lone focus for Bartlett's boys basketball team was to redeem itself and capture the Consolation C championship of the Jacobs Holiday Classic.
Mission accomplished.
Staving off a late fourth quarter rally by Crystal Lake South, the Hawks were able to claim consolation hardware with a 57-55 win Friday afternoon in Algonquin.
"Coach (Dan) DeBruycker plays a tough zone and that was good for us because we don't see a lot of zone in the Upstate Eight Conference," said Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith of his CL South counterpart. "We wanted to learn from the three losses in pool play and play better in the consolation bracket and we did. "
The key to Bartlett's victory and South's demise was the final 2:35 of the first half.
Nursing a slim 21-20 lead, the Gators were outscored 11-0 the rest of the half and the Hawks turned a deficit into a 10-point 31-21 halftime lead.
Led by 6 points from Matt Chaltin, the Hawks (7-6) connected on 5 of their last 7 shots of the half and held a double-digit lead over the Gators (2-9) after 16 minutes of action.
During that abysmal stretch, the Gators were 0-of-6 from the field and committed 5 turnovers.
"The last two minutes of the first half was the ballgame," said Crystal Lake South coach Dan DeBruycker. "We had way too many turnovers and had way too many brain cramps. "
The Hawks opened up their biggest cushion of the game at 37-24 after a layup by Jonathan Leigeber with 6:10 remaining in the third quarter.
The Gators methodically whittled away at the lead and got to within a point of the Hawks after 2 free throws from Eric Schiller to make the score 52-51 with 1:06 remaining in the contest. That was as close as Crystal Lake South would get.
With the Gators down by 2 with 4 seconds left, Schiller attempted a desperation 30-footer at the buzzer but it fell short and the Hawks had captured a narrow 2-point win.
Chaltin paced Bartlett with 23 points including three 3 pointers.
"We were probably in the toughest pool in the tournament so we tried to learn from the losses," said Chaltin. "It was good to come out of the tournament with two wins."
Lorenzo Mitchell added 13 points for the Hawks while Leigeber scored 11.
Max Meitzler led South with 15 points while Schiller tallied 12.
Jacobs 59, Marian Central 55: Bobby Mladenovic had 13 points and Alex Glover added 10 as Jacobs (2-8) escaped from its own holiday tournament with a win. Johnny Holbrook added 8 points for the Golden Eagles, who were down 29-27 at halftime but outscored Marian Central 21-12 in the third quarter.
Zion-Benton 68, Cary-Grove 44: Eric Graham and Casey Snodgrass had 9 points each to lead Cary-Grove (3-10) at the Jacobs tournament.
Marengo 60, Westminster Christian 40: Will Woodhouse had 18 points to lead Westminster (7-5) at the Marengo tournament.
Hampshire 68, DeKalb 66 (OT): Tyler Watzlawick scored 23 points to lead the Whip-Purs (3-7) to a big overtime win at the Chuck Dayton Tournament in DeKalb. Shyler Ralphs added 15 points for Hampshire while Tyler Crater and Shane Hernandez had 12 each.
John Radtke contributed to this report.