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St. Edward surprises Glenbard South

The St. Edward boys basketball team occupied last place in the seven-team Metro Suburban West entering Tuesday's home game against second-place Glenbard South, yet the Green Wave handled the Raiders with relative ease in a 61-49 victory.

Glenbard South (14-8, 6-3) enjoyed a distinct height advantage with 6-foot-5 junior Billy Bair, 6-5 senior Charlie Bair and 6-4 senior Johnny LaPonte, but the Green Wave made that trio earn their combined 35 points, led by Billy Bair's 23.

"They beat us up inside. We knew that was going to happen," St. Edward coach P.J. White said. "That Billy Bair is a great player. He was a tough guy to stop. We concentrated on stopping him, hoping they wouldn't be able to make enough shots from the outside and that's what happened."

Billy Bair shot 11 of 17 from the field but the rest of the Raiders shot only 9 of 29 (31 percent). Glenbard South made 3 of 11 attempts from 3-point range.

Meanwhile, St. Edward made 23 of its 44 shots (52.3 percent) and 6 of 12 from 3-point range. Senior guard Adam Radcliffe matched a career high with 19 points and 3 assists on Senior Night, and junior guard Kelvin Cortez-Harvey scored 19 points to go with 5 rebounds and 3 steals and 4 assists

Both contributed to St. Edward outscoring the Raiders 19-6 in the second quarter to take a 32-19 halftime lead. Radcliffe netted a pair of his four 3-pointers during the period while Cortez-Harvey scored 9 points.

Meanwhile, the St. Edward (13-11, 3-7) defense limited Glenbard South to 6 second-quarter points on 3-of-10 shooting.

"We fronted their big men and then we doubled down in the post," Radcliffe said. "I thought we did a pretty good job of that considering how many big guys they had.

"We had good rotations on defense with the big guys," Cortez-Harvey said. "We were defending them pretty well."

Glenbard South dominated the boards 26-17, but St. Edward made up for those possessions by forcing 16 turnovers while committing only 9.

"The effort was there from the start of the game until the end of the game," White said. "Our kids played hard. Their kids played hard. They just weren't making their shots."

Senior Andrew O'Neill finished with 11 points for St. Edward, 6 in the fourth quarter.

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