Glenbard East shows extra energy against Streamwood
Streamwood's second-half energy made Friday's Upstate Eight Conference boys basketball game entertaining, but Glenbard East's big first quarter was too much to make up.
The host's controlled chaos created a 28-8 lead after the first eight minutes and the Rams led by 29 at halftime. Though Streamwood cut the deficit to 14 in the fourth quarter, Glenbard East answered to win 92-62 in Lombard.
"In the locker room our coaches told us, in the first half we've just got to come out and have a lot of energy, so that's what we did," said Rams senior guard DaRon Hall. He made 10 of 12 free throws and scored 27 points to lead all players.
Immediately on fire, Hall canned a pair of 3s and scored 10 first-quarter points. Teammate Joe Hamilton scored only 3 points on a third-quarter 3 from a Hall assist, but Hamilton helped fuel transition with 3 early steals.
Glenbard East (2-2, 1-0) forced 9 first-quarter turnovers leading to 12-of-18 field-goal shooting.
Aside from senior guards Hall and Deon Cook, who scored 18 points, Glenbard East doesn't return a ton of minutes.
"One of the things we talked about coming out of Thanksgiving, was just kind of getting your feet wet, understanding how to play, the speed of it, and I thought tonight we really cranked it up and played as fast as we wanted to play," said Rams coach Scott Miller, who could only guess "seven, eight years ago" the last time the Rams scored as many points.
Boosted by 15-point scorer Terrence Spencer off the bench, Glenbard East led 52-23 at halftime. Streamwood (2-3, 0-1) then had its own talk.
"We didn't play with any confidence the first half," said Sabres coach Kent Payne. "We said, losing this is insignificant, but how are we going to compete? And I thought we really competed the second half."
Unleashing that same energy that served Glenbard East early, Streamwood forced five third-quarter turnovers and made only two itself, with junior guard Jakobe Strong scoring 10 of his team-high 20 points in the third quarter. Guard Zach Marquez, a 13-point scorer, also caught fire to help bring the Sabres within 68-48 after three quarters.
"We just started cutting, screening away for each other, getting our teammates open," Strong said. "Our coach always wants us to move fast. He wants us to press all game, try to get the ball back on defense to score on offense."
Streamwood got another push by forward Darrel Luce and a Strong 3 from the left corner to pull within 70-56 with 5:58 left in the fourth quarter. but Glenbard East responded with a 14-2 run over the next two and a half minutes to regain control.
"A lot of heart," Hall said, "no fear and just give it all you've got till the end."