York can't finish against Proviso West
Many games this winter have come down to the closing moments for the York boys basketball team.
In a West Suburban Silver matchup against Proviso West on Friday, the Dukes needed an extra moment or two.
When Erik Cohn's game-tying 3-pointer was waved off because it came after the final buzzer, the Dukes were left with a 55-52 loss in Elmhurst.
York, which entered the night in a three-way tie for second place in the league behind Oak Park, fell to 12-8 overall and 2-3 in the WSS.
"This is a great conference," said Cohn, who scored all of 12 points in the second half. "As Coach (Vince) Doran always says, there is no such thing as an easy game in this conference. It's competitive every year and we know that all of these games are going to be close.
"Sometimes we've been on the winning end when we finish it out and sometimes we don't. Tonight we weren't able to finish it out like we wanted to."
Trailing 23-16 after the opening eight minutes, the host Dukes seemed to seize control with a 16-0 run that stretched from the second quarter until shortly after halftime. But the Panthers clawed their way back, pulling to within 44-43 heading into the fourth.
York was then held to eight points in the final quarter - a layup by Angelo Martucci which gave the Dukes their final lead, a 3 by Nick Kosich that knotted the score at 49, and a three-point play from Cohn with under a minute left that pulled them within 53-52.
After two free throws by Proviso West's Timmeon Gamble with 37 seconds left pushed the margin to 3, York had one last chance to tie but a corner attempt missed. The home team grabbed the offensive rebound but the resulting pass to Cohn got to him too late.
"I thought we were locked in," Cohn said. "We just gave them too many easy baskets. We can't have that. And we missed a lot of shots, myself included. Everyone has games like that. But we made a good run against them, they are a good team."
Kosich finished with a team-high 15 points and Martucci also checked into double figures with 12. Nate Shockey added 7 points. John Young topped Proviso West (7-5, 3-2) with 17 points.
"I thought we lost our focus at a couple points of the game," York coach Vince Doran said. "Even at the start of the game, our focus wasn't great and we dug ourselves a big hole. Hopefully, we learn from it, but now having three losses (in the conference), this is a tough one. We just didn't get stops. Give their kids credit, they played a little better than us."