Lake Forest earns spot in sectional final

Rebounding is a pride thing for Evan Boudreaux.

The 6-foot-8 Lake Forest senior expects himself to get every defensive rebound there is, and as many offensive rebounds as humanly possible.

In leading the Scouts to a 54-47 victory over Evanston in a Class 4A sectional semifinal Wednesday at Waukegan, Boudreaux did pretty much that. He finished with 22 rebounds, to go along with a game-high 22 points.

An eye-popping 11 of his rebounds came in a fourth quarter in which Lake Forest was up by only 3 points at one point.

"I try to (go after every rebound) every game, but in a close game like this, I think it was really important," said Boudreaux, who will be playing at Dartmouth next year. "Especially in the fourth quarter, I didn't want to leave any chance. I wanted to make sure (Evanston) wasn't going to get the ball. I just tried to get every ball I could that was coming my way.

"Whether your shot is falling or not, you can always go out and rebound. Rebounding is one of the things I kind of pride myself on."

Now, Lake Forest (27-2) is out to rebound from its only two losses of the regular season. The No. 2 Scouts will face top-seeded Stevenson (26-3) in Friday's sectional championship game at Waukegan. Stevenson swept Lake Forest in North Suburban Conference Lake Division play.

"That's going to be huge," Boudreaux said of the matchup with Stevenson. "That's been our rivalry since we were little. We haven't gotten the better of them in a while. But we've had a lot of close games and we know we can play with them. We know we can beat them. I think it's going to be a great atmosphere on Friday."

Lake Forest last beat Stevenson when Boudreaux was a freshman. Last year, the Scouts took Stevenson to double overtime. This season, Lake Forest and Stevenson almost went to overtime again.

"You don't have to talk about (the matchup) at all with our kids. They know," Lake Forest coach Phil LaScala said of Friday's date with Stevenson. "We have to handle the pressure better than we did tonight. Less turnovers."

Lake Forest had 20 turnovers against Evanston's scrappy, trapping full-court press.

"This was a warm-up for Friday night," LaScala said. "Because (pressing) is what (Stevenson) is going to do to us, too. It bothered us the last time we played (Stevenson)."

Evanston (20-9) was down by as many as 13 points in the third quarter but cut that deficit to 37-34 early in the fourth by pressuring Lake Forest into mistakes while it brought the ball up the floor under duress.

Sophomore guard Nojel Eastern finished with a team-high 18 points for Evanston. He was the Wildkits' only double-figure scorer.

"We talked about how when we pressured them, they would turn the ball over," Eastern said. "In the third quarter, we pressured and that's what helped us out a lot with our scoring and transition buckets. That trap defense was a great aspect in us getting as close as we did."

Lake Forest pulled away on an 11-2 run midway through the fourth quarter that included two baskets by Lorenzo Edwards and a three-pointer by Steve Vogrich. Edwards was Lake Forest's only other double-figure scorer. He had 12 points.

"They deserve to go on and play in the sectional final," Evanston coach Anthony Ayeni said of Lake Forest. "We just didn't value the ball enough. Ironically, we valued it more on defense than we did on offense. We were out there scrambling to save our lives, trying to get that ball back. We just put a lot of pressure on ourselves by getting down like we did."