Lake Park perseveres, will play Benet in regional final

The mutual third-quarter offensive misery between Lake Park and DeKalb was replaced by a back-and-forth struggle of wills in the final quarter Wednesday night.

But the Lancers' Montrell Perry and Luke Sgarbossa came to the forefront when it mattered most in the second semifinal of the Class 4A regional in DeKalb.

Perry scored 12 of his game-high 17 points in the fourth quarter and Sgarbossa came back from the free-throw line abyss with critical makes in the final seconds to give Lake Park a 49-47 victory in boys basketball playoff action.

With the win the seventh-seeded Lancers (22-7) will meet No. 2 Benet for a second time this season in the final Friday night for a date in the Bartlett sectional Wednesday.

DeKalb, the No. 12 seed, had its campaign close at 19-12.

Perry supplied the dagger to DeKalb by draining his third 3-pointer of the game to give Lake Park a 42-40 lead with 1:21 to play.

The bomb from the deepest recesses of the right baseline, came after Zach Russell gave DeKalb its first lead of the game since Lake Park scored 10 unanswered points after the Barbs opened the game with the first 5.

"It was a great pass by Luke," Perry said. "He drew all the other defenders. I was wide open. I had to make some big shots."

The drama was far from over, however. Perry converted two free throws moments later to extend the Lake Park cushion to 5 points. But free-throw inconsistencies by the Lancers gave DeKalb hope.

Sgarbossa felt personally responsible for missing both the front end of the bonus and back-to-back free throws with Lake Park seeking to close out the game.

"Obviously, I was pretty disappointed about it," said Sgarbossa, who augmented Perry with 16 points. "My teammates had confidence in me I could knock them down if I had to."

The Lancers' trust was rewarded when Sgarbossa scored the last of his points with 21.2 seconds remaining from the line.

Perry iced the game with a breakaway score in the waning seconds.

Russell, who scored all of his team-high 13 points in the fourth quarter, hit his fourth 3-pointer of the game as time expired to make the final score more palatable for the Barbs.

Lake Park led by 25-19 at halftime, but neither team scored from the field in the third quarter as the Lancers' Trevor Montiel personally outscored the Barbs' Joe Owens 3-2 from the line for the only points of the quarter.

"I have never seen that before," DeKalb coach Al Biancalana said.