Crews, Grayslake Central spurt past Vernon Hills

The "late bloomer" was in full blossom Tuesday night.

Tony Crews, who started high school at "maybe 5-foot-5," has grown in just two years into a 6-foot point guard for Grayslake Central.

As he has grown, so has his game, and he had the best performance of his career against visiting Vernon Hills. Crews pumped in a career- and game-high 25 points, doing most of the damage from outside of his comfort zone, to lead Grayslake Central to a 58-49 nonconference victory.

The Rams improve to 5-3 on the season. Vernon Hills drops to 2-6.

"I'm a late bloomer when it comes to being a scorer," said Crews, who started on varsity last year as a sophomore. "I grew late, so I wasn't always able to score a lot. But I've gotten bigger and I worked a lot on my game this summer to be able to score more and now I'm starting to do that."

Funny thing is, Crews did almost all of his scoring from the paint, which isn't his usual spot. Normally, he loves to take 3-pointers.

But another Tony, Vernon Hills guard Tony Brown, was assigned to take the 3-pointer away from Crews.

Crews didn't even attempt a 3-pointer against Vernon Hills.

Instead, he used his newfound size to make a difference inside.

"He uses his body really well when he's going in for layups," Brown said of Crews. "And he's strong and drives hard. He's a big body, he's physical, he's a really good hustle player. It was fun going against him."

Crews had an equal amount of respect for Brown, whose strength is high-pressure on-ball defense. Just bringing the ball up the floor against Brown was tedious for Crews.

"He's a really good player," Crews said of Brown, who led Vernon Hills with 14 points and multiple steals. "And he's so great with ball pressure. It was almost a turnover for me every time. He's so good on defense. Since the ball pressure was so good, I thought getting the ball down low would be the only chance I'd have (to score)."

Up 27-26 at halftime, Vernon Hills built up a lead by opening the third quarter with a 9-4 run. But Grayslake Central answered with a 10-1 run. The Rams then took a 2-point lead (44-42) into the fourth quarter.

Free throws were the story of the fourth quarter as Grayslake Central shot 13 free throws, and Vernon Hills shot none.

Grayslake Central out-scored Vernon Hills 14-7 in the fourth quarter. Crews had 6 points in the fourth quarter.

"With Tony, you're going to get non-stop energy," Grayslake Central coach Kosta Kougias said. "This is his second year on varsity, but it's really his first year leading this team as the (starting) point guard. The ball is in his hands all the time and tonight he did a great job of recognizing the mis-match he had in the post."

Besides Crews, Jack Spalding also scored in double-figures for Grayslake Central. He had 13 points, including three 3-pointers.

Abraham Stacy added 12 points for Vernon Hills.

"We've had some other games come down to the wire like this," Vernon Hills coach Matt McCarty said. "But I've seen some growth. Our guys come to work every day and we're working on shooting more because sometimes we have trouble making baskets, and we're also working on taking care of the ball. But (losing games) is not because we're not putting in the work. We continue to see that growth and we're going to get one of these close games sometime soon."