advertisement

Lake Park finds its identity again against Naperville Central

Lake Park's defense found its feet again, frustrating Naperville Central with a 38-27 DuPage Valley Conference boys basketball win in Roselle on Friday.

The Lancers (16-3, 5-0) bounced back after letting up a season-high 61 points in their loss to Conant on Jan. 10, allowing a season-low 27 points, beating its previous low of 29 against Naperville North on Dec. 5.

“I thought that we got back to guarding how we have all year,” said Lancers coach Josh Virostko. “Since we won Wheeling (holiday tournament), last week was a terrible defensive week for us and that's been our (identity) all year. We won on the defensive end, and I think tonight they really came out and set the tone.“

Unlike its start against Conant, the Lancers got off to a fast start outscoring Naperville Central 10-2 in the first quarter thanks to their defense and patience in moving the ball offensively. They did not lose the lead.

“Our coach told us all week that it was the start of the game and start of the second half that killed us last week against Conant…,” said Lake Park senior forward Connor Vance. “So we knew we had to come out hot tonight, and that's what we did.”

The Redhawks, despite struggling offensively, brought the game within 5 points at halftime with the help of a driving Nate Dahl who had 6 of his teams 13 points in the first half.

Naperville Central (11-8, 2-3) outscored Lake Park 11-8 in the second to go into halftime down 18-13 and continued that momentum to help cut the lead to just one point with 2:31 left in the third quarter.

Dahl turned his sixth basket of the night into a three-point play to make it 24-23.

“I just think we got aggressive,” said Naperville Central coach Pete Kramer. “Decided to fight for a little while and we lost again. We had an opportunity to take a few charges to turn it around the other way and we didn't. Until we do the little things as a team we're not gonna be where we want to be and we're not going to win games like this.”

Despite the senior guard's game-high 16 points, the lack of execution from the rest of the team paired with the aggressive defense from Lake Park, the Redhawks were outscored 10-4 in the fourth quarter.

Lake Park had eight of its nine players chip in offensively, with Marcus McDaniel tallying 9 points and Vance with 7 points. The Redhawks had just four players score.

Article Comments
Guidelines: Keep it civil and on topic; no profanity, vulgarity, slurs or personal attacks. People who harass others or joke about tragedies will be blocked. If a comment violates these standards or our terms of service, click the "flag" link in the lower-right corner of the comment box. To find our more, read our FAQ.