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Glenbard West gets it sorted out

Steal, layup. Steal, dunk. Steal, pass, dunk.

That's how the Glenbard West boys basketball team quickly fell behind 6-0 Wednesday night to visiting Bolingbrook.

The Hilltoppers responded, however, with a 12-0 run and kept their composure until the end, surviving a Raiders shot at the buzzer to win 62-61 for an uplifting nonconference victory.

“The way we started out, it was one of those things where I don't think the guys realized the type of quickness they were playing against,” Glenbard West coach Tim Hoder said. “We got caught off guard a little bit those first couple plays, and then we adjusted fine. We had some turnovers, but I thought we handled the pressure.”

The Hilltoppers (5-8) turned the ball over 21 times but also knocked down 16 of 23 shots from the free-throw line. Glenbard West is especially happy to have forward Michael Mache and point guard Jeff Levesque back in the lineup following an injury-plagued first half of the season.

Mache scored a team-high 21 points, while Levesque scored 9 of his 12 points in the second half when the Hilltoppers were in a dogfight.

“We're just getting everybody back,” Hoder said. “We have to have everyone back to be successful. We can't be plugging holes all the time. We need everyone healthy and ready to go. ... Jeff made some huge plays for us to bring us back when we were down.”

Glenbard West had built a 9-point second-quarter lead before the Raiders (5-7) closed the gap to 3 at halftime.

The teams traded leads 13 times in the second half. Matthew Mache, who scored 13 points, knocked down two free throws with 22 seconds left in the game to give Glenbard West a 3-point lead, but Bolingbrook guard Dan Fisher hit a runner with 13 seconds remaining to get the Raiders within 1.

Hoder dialed up a play to get the ball to Michael Mache, and the 6-6 junior headed to the line to shoot two foul shots, having made 9 of 10 free throws at that point. He missed both, however, and the Raiders were left with 5 seconds and a chance to win.

“I got one waved off (earlier on a lane violation) and they started to tell me to take a few steps back,” Michael Mache said. “That kind of messed me up a little bit.”

Said Hoder: “There's no one we'd rather have up there than Michael at the end of the game. I'd put him on the line every time at the end. He wanted the ball and I wanted him to have it.”

Raiders guard Nick Malonga's 3-pointer at the buzzer was off and the Hilltoppers wound up on top.

It was another close loss for Bolingbrook, which received 22 points from Malonga, 14 from LaTree Russell and 10 from Fisher.

“We had chances to win the game all throughout the game,” Raiders coach Rob Brost said. “We just didn't play well throughout the course of the game and that's why we lost. Our execution in particular on the offensive end — we had some bad turnovers in the fourth quarter. It's a recurring theme. We need to execute down the stretch.”