South Elgin shoots past Maroons

While the temperatures outside may have been frigid things heated up in a hurry inside the South Elgin gymnasium on Friday night. The host Storm and visiting Elgin set a torrid pace in the first quarter combining for 21 baskets and 54 total points. However, the Maroons eventually cooled off while South Elgin (17-6, 10-2) remained red hot and pulled away to an 85-58 win in Upstate Eight Conference action.

Drake Montgomery led a quartet of double digit scorers for South Elgin with a team-high 20 points. Vince Miszkiewicz was right behind with 18 points. Trace Ashby added 16 and Alex Errington finished with 13 points.

Most teams would be happy to score 29 points like the Storm did in the first quarter, but head coach Brett Johnson wasn't too thrilled about giving up 25 points on the other end.

"It was just pretty much a track meet," Johnson said. "It was probably a lot of fun for the fans to watch, but not so fun for a coach. I thought we played out of control and undisciplined. That's not the style we want to play. We always want to be focused on playing solid defense and making good decisions on offense. We didn't really execute that plan for most of the first half."

Still South Elgin led 46-38 at halftime. But the second half was much more to Johnson's liking as the Storm tightened the screws on the defensive end to hold the Maroons to 20 points.

"We rebounded better and held them to just one shot," Johnson said. "We gave them some different looks defensively with zones and it paid off."

The Storm outscored the Maroons 22-8 in the third quarter to pull out to a 68-46 advantage.

"We started executing our press break," Johnson said. "We did a good job of making the extra pass and when Drake got the ball he did a great job of attacking the basket."

Montgomery had 12 points in the third quarter.

"I just started taking it to the rim," Montgomery said. "That first half isn't what we want. We want to be focused on locking teams down defensively. We flicked the switch on at halftime. We did a better job of identifying their shooters and staying in front of them."

Kamarr Banks had 20 points, including six 3-pointers, to lead the Maroons in scoring.

"We are seeing growth," Elgin coach David Hess. "We have been playing better in stretches on offense. Now we have to put that together for a full game.

"Give credit to South Elgin. They have a really good team. They have multiple guys who can score and who can shoot and that makes them tough to defend."