Joliet Catholic hands St. Edward its first loss

Ahead after the third quarter thanks to a long buzzer-beating 3-pointer by Joe French, St. Edward's boys basketball team looked to have the momentum to close out a pesky Joliet Catholic Academy team in an already thrilling back-and-forth fare to that point.

But it was not to be, as the Hilltoppers made enough clutch shots and free throws to sink the Green Wave 53-47 Thursday night in the 4th annual Burney Wilke Classic at Aurora Christian.

From the opening tip it looked like a strong zone defense by the Hilltoppers (3-4) would limit what St. Edward could do on the offense. Only Gino Domel and French scored for the Green Wave in the first quarter.

That defense turned into a well-rounded offense as four of the five starters for the Hilltoppers scored in the quarter, but no one scored more than the big combination down low in Drake Fellows and Luke Mander. They had 10 points in the quarter and gave their team a 15-10 lead.

While Domel and French were the only players to find the bottom of the net for the Green Wave (5-1), it was not for lack of trying. St. Edward had 12 shots from the field, including 8 from inside the arc, and hit just 4 of them. Compare that to 6 of 10 from the field for the Hilltoppers and St. Edward needed to do something fast.

Then the second quarter hit and that script was completely flipped for both teams, with Joliet Catholic hitting just twice on 13 shots and the Green Wave going 6 of 9 from the field.

"We didn't really adjust. We didn't do anything different, it was just a matter of making the shots that we had," St. Edward coach P.J. White said. "We had those shots the whole game, they just happened to fall in the second quarter. (In the first quarter) both teams got good shots off, they made theirs and we didn't."

One player to finally hit pay dirt in that second quarter for the Wave was Nick Duffy. After 4 missed shots in the first quarter, Duffy got through Fellows and Mander in the second and kept his stroke for the game, finishing with a team-high 14 points.

"They were really packing it in with the zone," Duffy said. "All we tried to do was spread them out, get the middle open so we could get in there."

With the shots finally falling, St. Edward found itself going from down 5 points to up 5, using a 10-0 run at the start and capping it off with a 3-pointer from Matt Hesch, his only points of the game, as time was winding down.

It was then the Hilltoppers' turn to go on a run at the start of third quarter, hitting their first 4 shots and forcing the Green Wave to call a time out with barely 2 minutes gone in the period. Mander scored 6 points in the third and finished with 10 for the game for JCA.

While the Green Wave kept up with the Hilltoppers in the quarter, thanks in part to Domel (10 points) and Duffy, they missed their first 5 shots of the second half from outside the arc and almost had none if not for French (11 points) and the last second 3-pointer.

In the fourth Jalen Jackson took over for the Hilltoppers and lit up the scoreboard, getting 11 of his 16 points in the quarter and going 4 of 5 from the line. Overall Joliet Catholic went 12 of 17 from the charity stripe, including 7-for-8 in the final quarter.

Though it was St. Edward's first loss of the season, White thinks his team can bounce back in time for Friday's matchup with Aurora Central Catholic.

"We've talked about what happens when a good team faces adversity," he said. "Good teams, they calm back down, they get after it and they win again. We took one little step back but hopefully that won't stop us from continuing to go forward."