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Aurora Christian goes cold in supersectional setback

DeKALB - Sometimes you lose a game, tip your hat and realize you lost to a better team.

That wasn't quite the emotions Aurora Christian felt after its season-ending 51-40 loss to Rockridge Tuesday night in the Class 2A NIU supersectional in DeKalb.

The final score was misleading. The Eagles played right with the Rockets - the third-place team in 2A last year - until the final 2 minutes. They trailed by 4 entering the fourth quarter and it was a 42-37 game with 2:40 remaining.

But the next 3 shots Aurora Christian took, by the players the Eagles want to shoot - Jake Wolfe, Pat McNamara and RD Lutze - were off the mark, and that 5-point game quickly became 14.

"I told everyone this week I thought we were pretty even," McNamara said. "Whichever team showed up to play would be going downstate. And we just didn't show up to play."

Not much would drop for the Eagles. Sharp-shooting RD Lutze, who nailed a long 3 in the final seconds Friday for a 59-58 sectional title win, finished 0-for-10 from the field missing all 9 of his 3s and scoring 2 points.

"They played great defense," Lutze said. "They got a hand in my face. They knocked me out of rhythm."

Lutze wasn't alone - Aurora Christian shot just 13 of 50 as a team and 4 of 21 from 3. Jake Wolfe, along with Lutze the team's scoring leader, finished 3 of 12 with constant double teams down low.

"They were strong," Wolfe said. "I think every time I got the ball I had two guys on me."

That was by design as Rockridge (27-4) did a great job taking away Aurora Christian's top options offensively and forcing the Eagles to find other ways to beat them.

The Eagles made just 6 of 19 shots in the first half and then went even colder in the second at 7 of 31 (22.6 percent).

"Tonight we looked and they had 2 real good scorers and we made sure we spent a lot of our energy on those two guys and not so much the other guys," Rockets coach Toby Whiteman said. "The kids just latch onto it. They have taken that mantra of defense wins games."

Aurora Christian finished the season at 25-6, one game away from its first trip to state since 1995.

There weren't many games in those 25 wins the Eagles shot the ball like they did Tuesday. Aurora Christian prepared for the spacious shooting background at the Convocation Center by opening the curtain behind the basket at its home gym.

That didn't help.

"Credit to their defense," Eagles coach Pat McNamara said. "We didn't get too many open looks out there.

"We were just out of sync today and it's probably a credit to their defense. We didn't get good looks. We took some shots we shouldn't. We didn't get any rebounds either. Offensively it was a recipe for not much success. We played the last three games and were crisp and really executed our stuff. Tonight we just didn't execute our stuff very well."

The Eagles graduate a senior class that includes the 1,000-point scorer Lutze, Jeremiah Wright, McNamara, Andrew Behrens and Dustin Barrett - who stepped up Tuesday with 8 points.

It's a group that will be missed. Wright's ridiculous speed getting from one end of the court to the other, McNamara playing heads-up basketball and hustling like crazy on defense like Wright, and Lutze knocking down 3s from anywhere on the court.

"I'm definitely proud of our team," Lutze said. "I think we had a great season. You just want it to continue. I was hoping to play at least two more games downstate. We just have to look back at the season we had and be proud. It was a fun run but it would have been really nice to get to Peoria.

"We're like brothers out there. There's friendships I've made that will last a lifetime. I can't thank Aurora Christian enough."

Coach McNamara couldn't thank his senior class enough, making sure to stress in the locker room all they accomplished and not the frustration of a cold-shooting end to the year.

"It's a great credit to them," McNamara said. "We just had a wonderful season. These guys should be able to look back on some fond memories. They had some big wins throughout the season.

"This group of seniors worked really hard. We have a pretty good culture now. We're pretty strong at the lower levels, we've got some guys coming back that can play. I think is lot of it is a tribute to the senior group. They really put basketball as a priority."

Images: Aurora Christian falls to Rockridge, 51-40 in boys supersectional basketball

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