Color Kohler, Lakes a winner

Orange isn’t one of the school colors at Lakes.

But the boys basketball team added some orange socks to its uniform on Saturday night for its game against visiting Deerfield. Just for the seniors, though.

“All the seniors went out to the mall to get some socks for Senior Night,” Lakes senior guard Jake Kohler said. “We wanted something different, something to help the seniors stand out.”

Kohler stood out anyway.

With 10 seconds remaining in a tie game, he got his number called for his team’s last shot at the basket.

Kohler posted up on the block, hauled in a pass from his teammate and made a strong move to the basket. His bucket with 3.6 seconds remaining, followed by a defensive stand by Kohler and his teammates in the final moments, sealed a 58-56 victory for Lakes, which improves to 21-6 on the season.

“We were fighting tooth and nail at the end and the ‘W’ is all that matters,” Kohler said. “It’s always great to beat a bigger school like this. It helps to put Lakes on the map and lets people know who we are.”

Kohler finished with 12 points and was one of four Lakes players in double-figures. Maybe it was the socks, because the other three double-figure scorers were also seniors.

Guard Andrew Spencer paced the Eagles with 14 points while forward Justin Bergeron scored 13 and guard Direll Clark added 12 points.

“This is a special group, these seniors,” said Lakes coach Chris Snyder, who coached the seniors when they were freshmen. “I’m glad we got the win, but when we were lining up at the start of the game and just seeing all those guys and having that flashback to when (Kohler, Bergeron and Clark) were brought up as sophomores…man, it goes fast. It’s so good we were able to get them off this home court with a win because there’s no other way for this group to go out. They’ve left quite a mark on this program.”

In a tight second half, Lakes built its biggest lead, a 5-point cushion, early in the fourth quarter. But Deerfield (10-15 overall) quickly cut its deficit and stayed within 1-point for the next few minutes after a series of 3-pointers. The Warriors were 9-of-19 from long range on the night.

“We were in the game the whole time because of our threes,” said Deerfield junior guard Eric Porter, who scored a game-high 19 points. “We just felt like whoever had the shot should take it because we have confidence in everyone. We’ve got a lot of guys who can hit the three.”

Jack Gurvey and Michael Alfieri also scored in double-figures for the Warriors. They finished with 13 and 11 points respectively. Gurvey had three 3-pointers.

“We are definitely looking to try to get open shots from the perimeter,” Deerfield coach Dan McKendrick said. “We’re just a young team and we made some mistakes at the end. I still feel like we’re trending up at this point. We’ve been real competitive with a lot of really good teams, including this (Lakes) team, which is the second seed in their sectional. That’s a very good team.”