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St. Charles East goes inside to beat Streamwood

Shaking off a lackluster first half, St. Charles East's basketball team opted for more of an inside-out approach in the second half.

The strategy paid off.

Sophomore forward Justin Hardy scored 10 of his team-high 15 points over the final 16 minutes as the fifth-seeded Saints (15-12) enjoyed second-half runs of 10-2 and 16-3 during their 51-36 Class 4A regional quarterfinal triumph over 11th-seeded Streamwood Monday night in St. Charles.

St. Charles East, which at one point trailed 18-12 early in the second quarter, carried a razor-thin 21-20 lead into a less than thrilled halftime locker room.

"We obviously weren't happy but we weren't doing things the way we practiced them the past few days," said Saints coach Patrick Woods, whose team advances to Wednesday's 7 p.m. semifinals against third-seeded Geneva (22-6).

"The further you go along in the tournament, you just don't have that big of a window to kind of regroup so we have to be much better on Wednesday if we want to have the same result."

After Sabres senior guard Joey O'Halloran tied the game at 23-23 with one of his six 3-point baskets, the Saints went on a 10-2 surge that included 6 points inside from Hardy and a 3-point play by senior forward Zach Hondlik (7 points, 8 rebounds, 6 assists) to take a 33-25 lead.

St. Charles East used its superior height to exploit mismatches inside against the smaller Sabres.

"That was a halftime adjustment we had to put in," said Hardy. "We weren't quite where we needed to be (in the first half) but we knew what we needed to do."

Another 3-pointer by O'Halloran helped the Sabres cut the deficit to 33-28 late in the third quarter until the Saints finally pulled away for good with a 16-3 tear that included back-to-back 3-pointers from James McQuillan (6 points) and Zach Mitchell (10 points).

Misfiring on 11 of their first 13 3-point attempts, the Saints knocked down four consecutive 3-pointers in during a 4-minute stretch in the final period.

"If we play inside-out, we're going to get the shots we like," said Hardy.

O'Halloran paced the Sabres with 20 points.

"Our defensive rotations fell apart in the second half," said Streamwood coach Paul Kowalyszyn, whose team showed marked improvement despite its 5-24 record.

"I thought this team took some steps in the right direction. We've got to keep building on this."

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