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West Aurora able to hold off Hinsdale Central

The West Aurora boys basketball team had something to be thankful for Wednesday afternoon following a disjointed 46-43 tournament win over Hinsdale Central.

Both teams appeared leg weary as each played its third game in as many days in a Hoops for Healing Thanksgiving Tournament matinee at Oswego High School. The teams combined for only 26 first-half points and each missed double-digit free throws.

"It was an ugly win, but a win is a win," said West Aurora junior Camron Donaltan, who led all scorers with 20 points.

What the contest lacked aesthetically it made up for in late drama. West Aurora junior Camron Donatlan scored the last of his game-high 20 points when he sank the first of 2 free throws with 6.5 seconds left. However, Donatlan's second free throw rimmed out.

Trailing by 3, the Red Devils pushed the ball up the court with no timeouts left. Hinsdale Central senior Tomas Misiunas raced up the right side and handed the ball off to leading scorer Jack Hoiberg on the right edge of the 3-point arc. Hoiberg had a good look at the basket, but his 3-point attempt caught the side of the rim just before the final buzzer sounded. He scored 8 of his team-best 13 points in the fourth quarter.

"With six seconds you have to run the entire length of the floor with no timeouts so it's just spread 'em out," Hinsdale Central coach Nick Latorre said of the final play. "And we got a pretty good look, I thought, given the situation. Our kids executed and we got a good shot out of it."

West Aurora (2-1) held Hinsdale Central (0-3) to 2 first-quarter points and the Red Devils shot 2 of 15 from the field in the first half.

However, after Donatlan scored the first 5 points of the third quarter to extend West Aurora's lead 6-point halftime lead to 21-10, Hinsdale Central answered with a 16-5 run to knot the score at 26-26.

"Just straight up toughness," Latorre said in describing his team's comeback. "Just straight-up playing with a bit of a chip on our shoulder and playing harder and tougher."

The Blackhawks gained a bit of breathing room at the start of the fourth quarter with a 6-0 run, capped by Donatlan's steal and breakaway dunk.

The Red Devils drew within 43-41 when Hoiberg split a pair of free throws with 19 seconds left, but Donatlan connected on 3 of 4 free throws down the stretch to give the Blackhawks their final margin of victory.

"We gutted out a win and a win I don't think we get last year," second-year West Aurora coach Brian Johnson said. "We played hard. Camron did a nice job. I thought he found good opportunities to attack the basket and he made shots down the stretch."

West Aurora shot 16 of 47 from the field (34 percent) and committed 17 turnovers. The Blackhawks won the rebounding battle 39-27, led by 12 rebounds from senior Caleb Siler.

"We just got flustered and didn't run our offense," said Siler, who scored 8 points. "We were just struggling trying to do our plays and then we were going one-on-one. Then we started pulling it together on defense and getting stops, but we need to make more layups. We missed a lot of layups."

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