Marist motors past Carmel

If anyone should have gotten off to a slow start Friday night at Carmel, it should have been the guys from Marist.

They had a marathon trek through rush hour traffic - 1 hour and 45 minutes, to be exact - to get from the South Side of Chicago to Mundelein for their East Suburban Catholic Conference showdown against the Corsairs.

Yet, it was actually Carmel that looked a little sluggish coming out of the gates.

The Corsairs took nearly six minutes to score their first point, and squeezed in their only field goal of the first quarter with just 41 seconds left. Meanwhile, Marist was busy rushing to a 13-point lead that laid the groundwork for a 54-36 victory over Carmel that was never in doubt.

The win moves Marist to 4-2 overall and 2-0 in the East Suburban Catholic. Carmel drops to 3-6 and 1-1.

"Even with the long bus ride, we knew we had to come out strong," said Marist junior guard Nick Valla, who tallied a game-high 21 points on 3 three-pointers. "We had to make sure to be ready and not take them lightly."

Marist was up 20-3 by the end of the first quarter and had limited Carmel to just six field goal attempts while also forcing 9 turnovers.

"It looked like it was going to be a blowout," Carmel junior forward Patrick Cox said of his team's big, early deficit. "We come out slow out of the blocks most of the time. If we can just get rid of that first quarter hangover, I think we'll be alright."

Cox, who scored a team-high 12 points, could be on to something there.

The Corsairs hung in there with Marist for the rest of the game and outscored Marist in a third quarter that saw them stage a bit of a rally.

Carmel was down 33-15 at halftime but opened with a 9-2 run that cut its deficit to 11 points at 35-24.

"The last three quarters it was pretty much an even game and I think that's more a credit to the effort that Carmel had and sustained," Marist coach Gene Nolan said. "Carmel played really hard. We just got off to a great start and that helped us."

Valla played a big part in getting the big lead. He scored 7 first quarter points for Marist.

Then, when Carmel went on its run in the third quarter, Valla almost single-handedly put a stop to it by scoring 6 of Marist's next 8 points.

"(Valla) is an exceptional high school player," first-year Carmel coach John Ryan said. "We knew how good he was, we earmarked him before the game and we still couldn't stop him.

"I think we played them pretty even, though, for about three quarters. Our goal now is to play four quarters. That will make a big difference. We've gotten off to a couple of slow starts and we can't afford to do that.

"But with a new coach and a new system, it's going to take time for them to get to a point where we want them to be. "

Besides Valla and Cox, no other players from either team scored in double-figures. Ryan Kloss had 9 points for Carmel while Christian Matthews and Mike Leveston each had 8 points for Marist.