Wheaton North finishes off DeKalb
The beginning was shaky and the ending scary, but Wheaton North finished a story that was worth writing home about on Wednesday.
Rowan McGowen and Luke Anthony each scored 15 points and fellow senior Jack Bennett added 8 points and 7 rebounds as the Falcons held off DeKalb 51-45 at the Class 4A York regional semifinals.
Wheaton North (22-6) will be riding an eight-game winning streak when it takes on Benet (23-6) in what figures to be a thrilling regional final Friday.
"I'm excited," Anthony said. "I hope we'll have a great crowd Friday night.
"I know they travel really well and their fans are great, but our fans are great also, so it will be a fun game."
The Falcons had fun against DeKalb, though the Barbs (19-11) made them sweat down the stretch.
Wheaton North led 49-35 following Anthony's layup with 5:05 remaining in the fourth quarter, but the Barbs scored the next 10 points.
Guard Michael Mitchell, who tallied a game-high 25 points on 9-for-13 shooting, scored the first 8 points, including back-to-back 3-pointers. Cole Tucker followed with two free throws to cut the lead to 49-45 with 2:35 left.
The Barbs had a chance to get even closer, but Tucker missed a contested layup and Bennett got the rebound.
Anthony, who had 10 points in the second half, sank both ends of a 1-and-1 with 37.7 seconds remaining and the Barbs missed four 3-point tries after that.
"You knew they were going to make a little bit of a run," Wheaton North coach Dave Brackmann said. "We didn't want it to, obviously, get that close, but they hit some tough shots, made some good defensive plays.
"But we found a way to win, got some rebounds at the end."
The Falcons didn't get much of anything in the first four minutes of the game. DeKalb led 9-2 when Brackmann burned a timeout at the 3:49 mark.
Matt Brcka's pullup baseline jumper got the Falcons going and McGowen's 3-pointer at the buzzer cut the deficit to 13-9.
Wheaton North took control in the second quarter, outscoring the Barbs 21-7 and limiting Mitchell to 3 points.
"We just really did our defense," Anthony said. "We kind of helped out on (Mitchell) a little and we made sure (Darvon Sisson) didn't get the ball in the post. So it was just overall a good team defensive effort."
DeKalb coach Al Biancalana was impressed with the Falcons' offense, which shot 7 for 11 in the second quarter.
"The second quarter really hurt us, and the third," Biancalana said. "For probably about 12 minutes there bridging the second and third quarters, I thought they really got into their flow offensively.
"That is such a fluid team; you've got to really disrupt what they do. We didn't do a good job with that."
Sisson, who combined with Mitchell to score all of DeKalb's 9 baskets in the second half, finished with 10 points, but the rest of the Barbs combined for 10 points.