WHEATON – A five-point play during a 10-0 run to end the third quarter helped propel the St. Francis boys basketball team to a 73-49 win against Aurora Christian in a Suburban Christian Conference Blue game Saturday.
The Spartans (5-0, 2-0 SCC Blue) led, 50-44, late in the third quarter when Killian Brown was fouled by Aurora Christian’s Ryan McQuade as Brown made a basket. McQuade disagreed with the call and was assessed a technical foul.
Brown hit his free throw to complete the three-point play and Andrew Kimball nailed the two technical foul free throws to complete the five-point play.
The Spartans retained possession as a result of the technical foul and increased their lead to 57-44 on another Brown basket. Kimball completed the run and the quarter with a three-pointer for a 60-44 lead.
“It had a major outcome on the game,” said Brown, a Geneva resident. "When I made that basket, my teammates were excited and (Aurora Christian) started losing control.”
McQuade is the son of Aurora Christian sophomore coach Bob McQuade.
“He’ll hear about it from his dad all the way home,” Aurora Christian coach Pat McNamara said. “The official made the right call. He said something to the official. You can’t say something to the official. I hope he learns something from it.”
Matt Bonner hit a bucket to start the fourth, Jason Sullivan hit a pair from the line and Kimball connected from three-point land to put the game out of reach, 67-44, early in the fourth quarter.
“Even though we were up, we knew the game was not over and they could have a streak coming back,” Brown said. “We just did what we did all game, moved the ball, played good defense and boxed out.”
St. Francis led, 21-15, after one quarter as the Spartans scored four points in the final five seconds on a free throw by Kimball and, following an Eagles’ turnover, a three-pointer at the buzzer by Nick Fabianski.
The Eagles (3-3, 0-2) cut the lead by a point and trailed, 39-34, at the half, thanks to 11 points by Cory Windle. Kimball also had 11 points at the half for St. Francis, all of them coming in the first quarter.
“I was not necessarily all that happy with how we were defending in the first half,” St. Francis’ coach Bob Ward said. “We average allowing in the low 40s for a game and we gave up 34 in the first half alone.
“It wasn’t like we made any halftime adjustments. It was more just we’re playing a good team with good scorers and we have to rely on what we do and play within the system. I thought in the second half we played much more within our defensive game. We were happy to hold them to 15 points in the second half.”
McNamara credited the Spartans with shutting down his team’s offense in the second half.
“They did a good job of taking us out of our offensive flow," he said. “And offensively, they broke our defense down. Right now we are a below average team defensively. That is something we’re going to have to change. We have a week of practice upcoming and we have to amp our defense up.”
Kimball led all scorers with 23 points. Brown had 13 and Jason Pisarski added five rebounds and five assists for the Spartans.
Guard Johnathan Harrell, who usually starts for the Eagles, came off the bench after missing two games with a concussion to score 14 points and grab 10 rebounds.
“I was happy for him,” McNamara said. “He is not where he is usually at, but he played pretty well considering he didn’t practice all week. He’s a vocal leader for us.”
Windle finished with 13 points and two steals, and point guard Ryan Suttle scored five points after missing a game earlier this season with a bad case of the hives.
