Not much scouting needed in Class 2A regionals

Familiarity rules when Class 2A boys basketball playoffs begin next week. Major speed bumps await.

In the Aurora Christian sectional, IC Catholic and Timothy Christian could play for a regional title a third straight year. IC Catholic has eliminated the Trojans each of the last two seasons.

In the Peotone sectional Interstate Eight Conference rivals Lisle and Westmont are the highest seeds at the Beecher regional. A third meeting could happen in the regional final.

A No. 1 subsectional seed, Westmont (23-4) must first focus on finishing strong in the IEC, where it joins Coal City in first place. The Sentinels hosted Streator on Wednesday and end their regular season Friday against - naturally - Lisle.

No. 4 seed Lisle (12-13) beat Westmont early on, Jakub Kowal, Elisha Basnight and Jay McGrath all in double figures at Lisle's Thanksgiving Tournament. Caden Anderson and the balanced Sentinels look to turn that around. Twice, maybe.

"Playing Lisle this Friday in a meaningful game and then potentially playing them a week later for a regional championship isn't ideal, but it does add an extra element of drama to the end of the season that should make for some pretty exciting games," said Westmont coach Craig Etheridge.

Good teams will bow out before the Peotone sectional final. The field includes subsectional No. 1 seed El Paso-Gridley, No. 2 seeds Chicago Christian and Fieldcrest, whose own regional champion will play the Beecher winner. No. 3 Corliss, a Chicago Public School team that's beaten Simeon, is an underdog by seed only.

Strange things happen. Peotone, a four-win team, has beaten both Westmont and Lisle.

Two-time defending Class 2A champion Orr is the No. 1 seed at its own regional of the Aurora Christian sectional. Orr's last two wins were over Corliss and Bogan, The Associated Press' No. 1 team in Class 3A. Uplift, Latin and the other No. 1 seed, Aurora Christian, will be hard outs.

The Orr regional winner plays the Timothy Christian regional champion in a sectional semifinal Feb. 26. IC Catholic (10-16) has lost to Orr the last two years in sectional play.

"The team they have this year is not quite to that level, but they're still going to make it extremely difficult for whatever team comes out of our regional. They have an athleticism that a lot of the teams in our regional don't see very often," said Knights coach T.J. Tyrrell.

A No. 4 seed led by Chauncey Lee, Zach Jordan and Dom Gaudio, IC Catholic must defeat No. 6 St. Edward a second time this season to reach a potential third straight regional final against No. 2 Timothy Christian. The Trojans were 17-9 entering Wednesday's game at Wheaton Academy with the Metro Suburban Red title at stake.

Paced by Matt Owens and Josh Harris, Timothy Christian opens Tuesday against either Walther Christian or Guerin. If the seeds hold it's IC Catholic-Timothy Christian in Friday's regional final. Again.

"I don't think you can ever get enough of two quality teams playing each other," said Trojans coach Scott Plaisier.

Put up your Dukes:

What to do with York?

As the state's Class 3A and 4A coaches get ready to seed the sectionals - seeds will be announced Thursday, with the pairings to follow on Friday - the Dukes are left to wonder what their fate will be in the Class 4A Proviso West sectional.

At 25-4 York boasts one of the top records at Proviso West. Two of those losses, however, came to Oak Park in West Suburban Silver play including Saturday's 54-52 defeat in Elmhurst. The Huskies (16-8) have twice as many losses as York, but will they be given the benefit of the doubt by coaches when they submit their seeds?

York could end up as high as No. 3, behind likely top seeds Curie and Young, but also could land as low as No. 8 or 9. It all depends on what the other coaches think of the Dukes' rèsumè.

"It's difficult because we don't have a lot of common opponents with the other teams," said Dukes coach Vince Doran. "For us ... who knows? We're the only team from DuPage County there."

Whether it's Lincoln Park, Riverside-Brookfield, Proviso East or Oak Park, any number of teams could vault ahead of the Dukes despite not having records as strong.

Regardless, the Dukes have the advantage of hosting a regional. With a veteran group - led by seniors Nick Kosich, Erik Cohn, Sam Walsh and John Milling, and junior Nate Shockey - they've lost only once at home this season.

But unfortunately for the Dukes, it was that lone home loss on Saturday that could prove damaging to their seeding.

"It was a big game for the sectional, but I don't know what's going to happen," Doran said. "I feel like we've played a good schedule and did pretty well so we'll see what happens."

Halftime:

Much was made during football season of the DuPage Valley Conference getting slashed from nine schools to five heading into this school year.

While not as drastic, the change also made an impact on boys basketball season.

The five remaining schools - Metea Valley, Naperville Central, Naperville North, Neuqua Valley and Waubonsie Valley - are playing a double round-robin DVC schedule of eight games instead of the 16-game slate of a year ago.

"I think 10 to 12 conference games is ideal," said Waubonsie Valley coach Jason Mead. "Eight is not enough, but 16 is way too many."

Naperville North tops the standings at 6-1 with a finale looming next Wednesday against Neuqua Valley. Waubonsie Valley sits in second place at 4-2, meaning the Warriors must hope for a Neuqua Valley victory to get a share of the DVC title.

With so few DVC games it's a pretty small margin for error.

On the bright side, though, playing eight conference games presents the opportunity to schedule up to 23 nonconference games. Waubonsie Valley (23-3) took advantage by scheduling - and beating - fellow Class 4A East Aurora sectional members Plainfield South, Yorkville, Oswego, Oswego East and Plainfield North.

Thanks, especially, to last week's wins over Oswego and Oswego East, the Warriors are now in line for a top-three seed at East Aurora.

Next season the DVC will boost its games to 10 with the addition of DeKalb.

"I like the flexibility in scheduling with fewer conference games, but I was scrambling to find games this year," Mead said. "With two bye weeks, the pressure to fill those weekends with a game is hard on scheduling."

Twitter: @doberhelman1

Twitter: @kevin_schmit