Yes, I'm finally getting around to the recap of the Portage and all-star games. I'm building anticipation.
Anyway, a week ago Monday we went to the Courts of Northwest Indiana, Portage's home court, for our final girls' and boys' varsity games of the year. However, when we scheduled this game last fall, we did not tell Portage that we wanted to play their boys' varsity this year. They assumed we wanted the same game as last year, a JV game, so that is what they scheduled.
The first game on the schedule was the girls' game. Last year HSRC won by I believe five or so, in a very tense game, both on the court and on the bench. Those of you who were there will know what I'm talking about. We had seen Portage at the Grace tournament. They seemed to have different players from one game to the next, so we weren't sure who we would be facing. We soon found out that PCS only had six girls there, but both of their quick little guards and one of their very tall forwards were included in that six. Coach Boss, however, designed a game plan to draw out the big girl from underneath by bringing Rachel up to the elboy, and that with some very good perimeter defense kept us in the game for a while. After one quarter, PCS's lead was only two. The girls continued to hang tough in the early part of the second, keeping the lead to four until near the end of the quarter. PCS scored to go up 16-10, and then got the ball back with a few seconds to go and managed get another basket at the halftime horn, so the lead was eight heading into the second half. Rachel had gotten into foul trouble so she had to go to the bench, and she took most of our interior defense with her. PCS kept working the ball inside and there was very little we could do. Cass kept up the offense, but we game up nearly as many points in the third as we did in the first two quarter. PCS outscored our girls 17-9 in the quarter. The fourth was even worse. Our offense and defense abandoned us, but the girls never gave up. Portage ended up with a 54-24 victory. Rachel (12) and Cass (10) scored all but two of our points (which were scored by Carolyn on a nice little drive to the basket). Rebounds were hard to come by - Rachel led the team with five. Rachel also had two steals and an assist. Corinne contributed the only block of the game.
As mentioned earlier, the boys played PCS's JV team. Last year we played their JV team with a couple of varsity players and lost 38-19. This year it was exclusively their JV team, and the result was quite different. The guys started the game hot from the outside. Sam and Dan each hit a three and a two, and Justin pitched in with a basket underneath. On the other side of the court, the pressure defense was effective against Portage, holding them to six. Our offense cooled in the second, as the shots would not go down. Michael got a two-pointer and Dan hit another three, but that was it. The defense however, made up for it. If they weren't forcing turnovers, they were making the Pacers take bad shots. Portage got no points in the quarter, so it was 17-6 HSRC at the half. The third quarter was quite different than the second. The Patriots outscored PCS again, but it was 14-13 in this quarter. Our outside shooting picked up again while Luke L and Justin each scored down low. Portage found their shooting touch as well, hitting three threes and two twos. HSRC maintained the offense in the fourth, as well as the balance. Six players contributed to the thirteen scored in the quarter. The defense was intense, only allowing five shots, one going in (a three). Final score - 44-23, HSRC Patriots. A nice game to finish the season. Dan led in scoring with thirteen and Sam had twelve. Both guys shot 50% or better from the field. Nate, Luke L and Justin each had four rebounds and Justin also had four steals.
The all-star games the next night were fun. The girls started and the difference in ability of the MCAC players compared to the rest of the teams was quite apparent. Mainly due to their play, the East girls won, I believe by about seventeen. Rachel had a nice game with seven points, ten rebounds and three steals. Cass also played well. At halftime, the boys' three-point contest was held. Lucas did well, finishing tied for fourth. In between games, a shooting contest was held with two boys and one girl from each program. Calumet set the standard early, and no team could match it. The boys game was the opposite of the girls' game: the West jumped to a big early lead. The East made a run in the second half, but only got as close as eight, I believe. Justin and Sam both played well, scoring six and twelve, respectively. The girls's three-point contest, held at halftime of the boys' game was exciting. Cass hit seven and held the lead for a short time, but the MCAC girl, in the last group to shoot, made nine so Cass finished second. All in all, a very fun night.
Last night was the season-ending banquet. After a delicious potluck, awards and certificates of participation were presented. The Lorenzes continued their tradition of putting together season-summarizing photo montages, and everyone enjoyed the food and fellowhip. See you next year!
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Final basketball post of the 2010-2011 season
Well, that's it. The 2010-2011 basketball season for the HSRC Patriots is in the books. I don't think I'll take this opportunity to recap the year; I may do that in a later post. Let me just summarize the state tournament games for our junior high and varsity boys, the final regular season games against Portage, and the conference all-star festivities.
First, the state tournament. The junior high tournament took place on Friday, February 25 - it did for us, anyway. The championship game was played on Saturday. We didn't quite make it to that, so both our games were on Friday. The first one was against HRK-Gurnee, who we had played earlier in the year. We lost that game 33-12, but we were without the Powers boys (and dad) in that game. HRK put up a lot more shots than us in the first, making three of seventeen, while we went one for seven. The shots were more even in the second, but HRK kept shooting a better percentage. #32, who went oh-for-six in the first, stopped shooting, and the rest of the team went five-for-eleven. Adam was bottled up inside so he couldn't get off too many shots, making only two free throws. Trevor added a basket and it was 17-6 HRK at half. Things slowed down considerably in the fourth. We packed in the defense and they slowed the pace. We managed four again with Adam and Trevor each making a basket, while completely shutting down the Eagles. HRK scored one early in the fourth to make it 18-10. Henry made a three, but HRK went into a stall and we couldn't get the ball back, so 18-13 was the final. Adam had six points, eight rebounds and two blocks. Trevor led the team with nine rebounds.
Game two was also a rematch. The opponent was Crossroads' 12U team, essentially players seventh grade and younger. That one was played without Devon, who missed the game with a sprained ankle. The first contest was a blowout, with Crossroads winning 51-13. This game was much more tightly contested. We trailed 12-1 at the end of one in that game; in this one we were only down 12-8. Adam did all the scoring with three baskets and two free throws. He also was piling up the rebounds. Crossroads opened up the lead to ten by half. Adam got four more in the quarter and Trevor added a freethrow, but Crossroads scored eleven. Adam already had sixteen rebounds at this point. We played evenly with Crossroads in third. Trevor scored a basket, Devon had a bucket and a freethrow, and Adam scored three. Crossroads played tough defense in the fourth, and we had to start fouling to get the ball back. The Crusaders got nine in the quarter, seven from the free throw line. We only managed four, so the final was 41-25. Not very close, but a lot better than 51-13. Adam had a monster game. He scored fifteen, but the big number was 30, as in 30 rebounds, a record that will likely not be broken for a long time. Peter H. added eleven rebounds as a part of the biggest rebounding game (50) the junior high had all year. Peter also had two rebounds and two steals. Trevor also had two steals. The junior high ended up with a 5-10 record.
The varsity had their first game at 8:45 Saturday morning, also against a team they had already faced, HRK Gurnee. It was not a very good game for us. We were down by 24 at the half and lost 55-22. We played a much better first half in this one. We only trailed by two at the end of the first. Sam, Stan, Justin and Lucas all contributed to the eleven the Patriots scored in the quarter. The second was also a good quarter. Gurnee pushed the lead up to ten at one point, but the guys got it back to a five point deficit by halftime. The scoring continued to be balanced, with Mike, Sam, Stan, Justin and Lucas all scoring in the quarter. That was pretty much the end of our good play for the day, however. HSRC couldn't stop #24 in the third, while we had trouble getting shots off, then had trouble making them. Our balance also went away, as Justin got all our points. HRK increased the lead to sixteen by the end of the quarter. We played them pretty even in the fourth, but couldn't get any offense going to make a run. We only made two for eleven, the last one being a three by Ben that went in to make the final score 55-38. Justin led in scoring with thirteen, with Sam, Stan and Lucas contributing six each. Justin also had six rebounds and three steals. Sam had two assists and Luke L had two blocks.
Our final opponent for the tournament was Crestwood Cavalry, the team Coach played for. We knew they were tough, and it turned out they were too tough for us. They played probably the toughest defense we faced all year and came out on top 58-22. They opened up a 19-5 lead after a quarter, with their points coming mostly inside even though our guys were playing a tight zone. We couldn't get any shots off, nor did we rebound well. The Patriots played better in the second, only getting outscored by two. Mike, Sam, Justin and Nate all scored. The third quarter was a disaster, expecially offensively. The guys only got seven shots off and none went in. Their coach's son continued to score, getting eight in the quarter, and his teammates added five more. 43-14, Crestwood, at the end of three. Crestwood continued their steady scoring in the fourth, while HSRC scored a threes by Luke D and Dan, and a basket by Justin. We shot 8 for 32 in the game. Crestwood had 21 more shots than the Patriots as they outrebounded us by nine and had eighteen fewer turnovers. Justin had six points and Dan had five. Justin had six rebounds to lead the team, Stan had two assists, Sam had three steals, and Nate had two blocks.
I will summarize the Portage game and the all-star festivities in my next post.
First, the state tournament. The junior high tournament took place on Friday, February 25 - it did for us, anyway. The championship game was played on Saturday. We didn't quite make it to that, so both our games were on Friday. The first one was against HRK-Gurnee, who we had played earlier in the year. We lost that game 33-12, but we were without the Powers boys (and dad) in that game. HRK put up a lot more shots than us in the first, making three of seventeen, while we went one for seven. The shots were more even in the second, but HRK kept shooting a better percentage. #32, who went oh-for-six in the first, stopped shooting, and the rest of the team went five-for-eleven. Adam was bottled up inside so he couldn't get off too many shots, making only two free throws. Trevor added a basket and it was 17-6 HRK at half. Things slowed down considerably in the fourth. We packed in the defense and they slowed the pace. We managed four again with Adam and Trevor each making a basket, while completely shutting down the Eagles. HRK scored one early in the fourth to make it 18-10. Henry made a three, but HRK went into a stall and we couldn't get the ball back, so 18-13 was the final. Adam had six points, eight rebounds and two blocks. Trevor led the team with nine rebounds.
Game two was also a rematch. The opponent was Crossroads' 12U team, essentially players seventh grade and younger. That one was played without Devon, who missed the game with a sprained ankle. The first contest was a blowout, with Crossroads winning 51-13. This game was much more tightly contested. We trailed 12-1 at the end of one in that game; in this one we were only down 12-8. Adam did all the scoring with three baskets and two free throws. He also was piling up the rebounds. Crossroads opened up the lead to ten by half. Adam got four more in the quarter and Trevor added a freethrow, but Crossroads scored eleven. Adam already had sixteen rebounds at this point. We played evenly with Crossroads in third. Trevor scored a basket, Devon had a bucket and a freethrow, and Adam scored three. Crossroads played tough defense in the fourth, and we had to start fouling to get the ball back. The Crusaders got nine in the quarter, seven from the free throw line. We only managed four, so the final was 41-25. Not very close, but a lot better than 51-13. Adam had a monster game. He scored fifteen, but the big number was 30, as in 30 rebounds, a record that will likely not be broken for a long time. Peter H. added eleven rebounds as a part of the biggest rebounding game (50) the junior high had all year. Peter also had two rebounds and two steals. Trevor also had two steals. The junior high ended up with a 5-10 record.
The varsity had their first game at 8:45 Saturday morning, also against a team they had already faced, HRK Gurnee. It was not a very good game for us. We were down by 24 at the half and lost 55-22. We played a much better first half in this one. We only trailed by two at the end of the first. Sam, Stan, Justin and Lucas all contributed to the eleven the Patriots scored in the quarter. The second was also a good quarter. Gurnee pushed the lead up to ten at one point, but the guys got it back to a five point deficit by halftime. The scoring continued to be balanced, with Mike, Sam, Stan, Justin and Lucas all scoring in the quarter. That was pretty much the end of our good play for the day, however. HSRC couldn't stop #24 in the third, while we had trouble getting shots off, then had trouble making them. Our balance also went away, as Justin got all our points. HRK increased the lead to sixteen by the end of the quarter. We played them pretty even in the fourth, but couldn't get any offense going to make a run. We only made two for eleven, the last one being a three by Ben that went in to make the final score 55-38. Justin led in scoring with thirteen, with Sam, Stan and Lucas contributing six each. Justin also had six rebounds and three steals. Sam had two assists and Luke L had two blocks.
Our final opponent for the tournament was Crestwood Cavalry, the team Coach played for. We knew they were tough, and it turned out they were too tough for us. They played probably the toughest defense we faced all year and came out on top 58-22. They opened up a 19-5 lead after a quarter, with their points coming mostly inside even though our guys were playing a tight zone. We couldn't get any shots off, nor did we rebound well. The Patriots played better in the second, only getting outscored by two. Mike, Sam, Justin and Nate all scored. The third quarter was a disaster, expecially offensively. The guys only got seven shots off and none went in. Their coach's son continued to score, getting eight in the quarter, and his teammates added five more. 43-14, Crestwood, at the end of three. Crestwood continued their steady scoring in the fourth, while HSRC scored a threes by Luke D and Dan, and a basket by Justin. We shot 8 for 32 in the game. Crestwood had 21 more shots than the Patriots as they outrebounded us by nine and had eighteen fewer turnovers. Justin had six points and Dan had five. Justin had six rebounds to lead the team, Stan had two assists, Sam had three steals, and Nate had two blocks.
I will summarize the Portage game and the all-star festivities in my next post.
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