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St. Edward falls despite Cortez-Harvey's big night

You tend to learn a lot when you play the conference big dog.

So what did the St. Edward boys basketball team learn Tuesday in its 75-41 loss to Metro Suburban West leader Riverside-Brookfield?

Slow the game down against a bigger, faster opponent, and defend the perimeter. Take care of the basketball and minimize mistakes.

And oh, by the way? Kelvin Cortez-Harvey is pretty darn good.

The junior guard had a game-high 29 points for the Green Wave, hitting 12 of his team's 17 field goals, despite being constantly double-teamed. He shot 60 percent from the floor (12-for-20), including 6-for-7 in the fourth quarter after the game was well out of hand.

"I was trying to be more aggressive and attack the hole a little bit," he said. "I was trying to attack them and get them into foul trouble early in the game. I know we got a couple of guys into foul trouble and that helped us out."

"Kelvin will be the first one to tell you it's not about him, it's about everyone else," added St. Edward coach P.J. White, whose team fell to 9-8 overall and 1-4 in the Metro Suburban West. "Kelvin is one of players that can play at that speed level.

"A lot of the offense we had was predicated on the outside game because we didn't have anybody to go inside. We knew we were going to have to shoot from the outside to stay with them, and that's where Kelvin came in."

Riverside-Brookfield isn't the league leader for nothing. It parlayed a 12-0 first-quarter run and a 10-0 second-quarter spurt into a 35-16 halftime lead, and never looked back. The Bulldogs added insult to injury for the Green Wave by shooting 8-for-9 (88 percent) in the third quarter, canning 4 of its 12 3-pointers in that period.

But the Bulldogs had little answer for Cortez-Harvey. He scored every single one of his team's points save 1 in the second quarter, including a jumper from the free-throw line at 6:23 and a 3-pointer at 5:06.

He added another 3 from the right arc with 1 minute to go in the third quarter that pulled the Green Wave to within 52-27. He also scored his team's last 10 points of the contest.

Riverside-Brookfield (13-2, 6-0) placed 4 players in double figures in scoring, and outrebounded the Green Wave 22-15.

"We do nothing but get better by playing teams like that," White said. "The whole idea for our program is to be as good as their program."

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