Tompson, Vikonis carry Bartlett past South Elgin
Ben's back and Bartlett's in business.
Senior Ben Tompson returned last weekend from an ankle ligament injury that kept the all-area guard sidelined for over six weeks, but he was purposefully limited to 10 minutes per game in a pair of losses against highly regarded West Aurora and Fremd.
With no such restrictions on Bartlett's leading scorer on Friday, he delivered 10 of his 22 points in the fourth quarter of the Hawks' 61-56 Upstate Eight Valley win at rival South Elgin, matching the 22 points scored by teammate Tomas Vikonis.
"It felt good," Tompson said. "Tomas and (Austin Gates) were able to handle a lot of the ballhandling and stuff. I was able to play off them well. I don't think that South Elgin knew I would be pretty much at full strength. I think that definitely helped."
Tompson drove for a left-handed bucket with under six minutes left and teammates Ben Fisher and Vikonis found him for layups twice, the last of which gave Bartlett (11-9, 3-3) a 53-47 lead with 1:22 to play.
"We let them drive at will," South Elgin coach Brett Johnson said. "When you do that against a driving team and they score, there's nothing you can do. Even if you get rebounds, they're still going to keep going at you. We didn't guard the paint like we were supposed to and they all took advantage of it - Gates, Vikonis and Tompson - driving hard to the basket."
South Elgin (13-7, 3-3) didn't go away quietly. The Storm drew within 55-54 with 30 seconds left when junior Jace Warrick nailed a 3-pointer from the right wing.
However, South Elgin immediately fouled junior Garrett Jurina in the backcourt and he sank both free throws to restore Bartlett's 3-point lead.
The Storm had a chance to again draw within a point or tie, but Nathan Rohr's fadeaway jumpshot in the lane didn't fall and a putback attempt by Vince Miszkiewicz rattled out.
The Hawks got the rebound, Tompson was fouled and sank 2 free throws separated by a South Elgin timeout to give Bartlett a 59-54 lead with 15.1 seconds remaining.
The Storm made it a 3-point game on Drake Montgomery's drive for a layup with 10 seconds left, but Vikonis drained 2 free throws with 8.1 seconds remaining to make it a 2-possession game. The Hawks sank 10 of 12 fourth-quarter free throws and 24 of 29 overall.
The victory was payback for Bartlett, which lost on its home court to South Elgin 71-61 on Dec. 15 while Tompson was sidelined.
"We didn't want to lose another one to our rivals," said Vikonis, who scored 9 of his 22 points in the third quarter. "We wanted to get one back on their court. We started playing like a team, moving the ball around. We all got easy looks."
Senior forward Ben Fisher scored 9 points and grabbed 5 rebounds for Bartlett.
Drake Montgomery led the Storm with 16 points while Miszkiewicz had 11 points and 10 rebounds, David Binion added 8 points and 7 rebounds and Nate Rohr finished with 9 points via 3-pointers.