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Elgin falls to Schurz in opener

The Elgin boys basketball team came up one bucket shy in a 63-61 loss to Schurz at the Wildcat Turkey Classic at West Chicago Wednesday night.

But were the Maroons actually a bucket shy?

In the middle of the fourth quarter, Elgin asked the referees to double check the scorebook, saying a made basket had not been counted on the scoreboard. The book checked out, so the game continued to the vocal displeasure of Elgin's fans.

The Maroons later used an 8-0 run to trim a 10-point deficit to 63-61. Michael Weatherburn's reverse layup with 26 seconds left drew Elgin within a basket.

The Maroons got the ball back on a turnover in the final seconds, but J.T. Fortmann's shot caromed off the iron and Schurz grabbed the rebound to end the game.

Afterward, Elgin coach Mike Sitter didn't want to comment on the score discussion, focusing instead on his team's spurt to make it a one-possession game at the end.

"We played exactly like we practice. We practice in spurts," Sitter said. "We don't usually put a full two-hour practice together. It kind of goes hard for a while and then guys start taking it easy. That's kind of how we played tonight and you can't do that if you want to win varsity basketball games."

Dan Toolsie led the Maroons with 20 points. Tre Morris had 12 points, including a pair of 3-pointers, and Weatherburn finished with 10.

Elgin was at its best when it employed its pressure defense.

"That's how we're going to have to do it, rotate guys in," Sitter said. "We have no natural scorers. We're just going to score off our defense, being aggressive and going to the rim. Hopefully, they learned from that and we can do it for four quarters on Friday."

Elgin plays West Chicago on Friday at 4:30 p.m.

  Elgin's Michael Weatherburn goes up for a shot over Schurz's Elijah Clay during varsity boys basketball in West Chicago Wednesday. Mark Black/mblack@dailyherald.com
  Elgin's Michael Weatherburn goes up for a shot over Schurz's Kenya Milton during varsity boys basketball in West Chicago Wednesday. Mark Black/mblack@dailyherald.com
  Elgin's Michael Weatherburn drives around Schurz's Jaland Mitchell during varsity boys basketball in West Chicago Wednesday. Mark Black/mblack@dailyherald.com
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