St. Charles North steps forward at Lake Park
The DuKane Conference's best boys basketball team wasn't decided on Saturday, but St. Charles North felt a whole lot better about the debate by the end of the night.
The North Stars rallied to claim a key conference victory by beating Lake Park 55-48 in Roselle.
After falling behind by 11 points early in the second quarter, the North Stars (11-3, 4-0) became near flawless offensively. Luke Scheffers scored 10 of his team-high 14 points in the second quarter as the entire team came alive.
"Most people would think we're doubting ourselves but, no, we've been here before," Scheffers said. "We knew what we're capable of. We just kept having confidence in our guys and we just kept playing the way we know how to play."
While the Lancers (13-2, 3-1) expected Scheffers and 6-foot-9 Bradley-bound Connor Linke, who had 9 points and 11 rebounds, to make a dent, the bench contributions from Nick DeMarco and Max Love were backbreakers.
The duo combined for 20 points and five 3-pointers. Each bucket was more demoralizing than the one before as the North Stars - after making only 2 of 11 first-quarter shots - knocked down 15 of 21 shots in the final three periods and committed only 8 turnovers in the game.
"That's big to get that kind of effort off the bench," said Lancers senior forward Trevor Montiel, who scored a game-high 19 points before fouling out in the final minute. "I'm mad because it's conference, but it gives us a reason to play harder every conference game from now on. Winning the conference is still our goal."
In the third quarter and opening minutes of the fourth, the lead changed hands four times and there were six ties. St. Charles North took the lead for good after a DeMarco 3-pointer and a Linke three-point play.
"We had to stay clean and hold them to one-and-done, and I thought we did a pretty good job of that for the majority of the game," said North Stars coach Tom Poulin.
Joe Harrington answered with his own three-point play for the Lancers, but the North Stars scored 7 straight points to seal the victory.
Luke Sgarbossa scored 7 of his 15 points in the fourth quarter for Lake Park.
"They just started making shots," said Lancers coach Billy Pitcher. "Their guys stepped up. It was simple Basketball 101. They hit more shots than us."
Twitter: @kevin_schmit