Plano Tournament 2008

Red Devils Finish 5th with Win Over Forreston

by Mike Struna

December 23, 2008

Round 2 game- Genoa Kingston-47 Hall-39

Round 3 game- Hall- 72 Aurora Christian- 67 OT

Hall- 55 Forreston- 45 (5th place)

Santiago, Hall dial long distance to top Aurora Christian

By Chris Yucus
cyucus@bcrnews.com
Tuesday, December 30, 2008 12:06 AM CST

PLANO — Hall rallied to erase an early deficit, using the long ball to come out on top of Aurora Christian 72-67 in overtime Monday at the Plano tournament.

After a Nate Hill three-pointer put Aurora Christian on top 62-61 early in the overtime period, Hall’s Noel Santiago immediately responded with a trey of his own, the seventh of the evening for Santiago. Santiago’s three, which was made from the top of the key with a defender in his face, put the Red Devils up for good.

“That’s one of the things that makes a coach’s heart jump up,” said Santiago of his quick shot. “I just felt good shooting today. I didn’t think about it, I was in a little rhythm.

“If I would have missed it, it would have been bad, but I was just glad to hit it.”

Santiago led all scorers with 29 points in the contest and also hauled in seven rebounds.

While Santiago’s trey put the Red Devil’s back in the drivers seat, 64-62, it was free throws down the stretch in overtime that sealed things up for Hall. The Red Devil’s last eight points of the evening all came from the foul line, as Ben Miklavcic, Wes Herrmann, and Nick Rounds all hit pairs of foul shots, while Santiago and Brian Nolasco added one apiece. Hall shot 77 percent from the charity stripe, knocking down 20 out of 26 in the game, a big factor in the win.

Rounds was particularly clutch for the Red Devils, as he hit a pair of free throws with 23 seconds left in the fourth quarter that put Hall up two, 57-55. Those free throws served as an insurance clause for Hall, as the next trip down the floor Aurora Christian’s Jordan Roberts converted on a layup to tie things up at 57 apiece right before the end of regulation.

Rounds said that perfect six for six showing from the free-throw line resulted in part from a change in approach. “I used to dribble it twice, but today at practice I held in my arm and took a deep breath and just shot. I switched to that and shot free throws well tonight.”

Rounds, who finished with 17 points, also felt comfortable behind the three-point arc, notching three of seven attempts from downtown. Miklavcic, who scored 16 in the win was also accurate from deep, knocking in two of four. Hall combined to shoot 12-24 on three-point field goals (Santiago was seven for 13).

In the first quarter it was Aurora Christian with the hot hand from behind the arc, as Hill dropped in back to back bombs early in the frame, and teammate Jeremy Anderson did the same in the final minute of the quarter helping give the Eagles a 14-point, 25-11, advantage at the end of the first quarter.

Hall coach Mike Filippini credits a switch in defensive tactics with helping Hall turn things around.

“We came out in a two-three and they hit every shot that they took...the change in the game came in the second quarter when we just played man to man, and we played man pretty much the entire rest of the game,” Filippini said.

With better defensive pressure Hall was able to trim the early 14-point Aurora Christian advantage to an eight-point, 34-26 deficit at half time.

Hall continued to gain ground in the third, outscoring the Eagles 16 to nine in the frame to enter the fourth quarter down only one, 43-42.

The Red Devil’s took their first lead since the opening moments of the game when a Rounds’ three with 3:53 left put them up two, 50-48. After Hall grabbed the lead, both teams traded points all the way until overtime when Hall finally emerged victorious.

Filippini was proud of his troops effort and tenacity.

“I give them a lot of credit for a heck of comeback,” Filippini said. “It would have been awful easy to quit in this game as far as we were down, but they just kept fighting.

Aurora Christian’s Hill lead his squad with 21 points, including three of five shooting from behind the arc, Roberts added 14 points in the loss for the Eagles.

With the win, Hall advances to the fifth-place game at 5 p.m. Tuesday against Forreston, a 54-42 winner over Somonauk.

Indians play well, but fall to Red Devils
The Times Sports Staff

PLANO — In the opener of the 2008 Plano Christmas Classic on Friday, unseeded Sandwich put up a fight before falling 63-56 to Hall.

Sandwich (0-10) committed nine-second quarter turnovers and trailed third seeded Hall High School 37-25 going into the locker room at the half.But the Indians would regroup and cut the Red Devil lead to 47-40 after three periods and then to 54-49 with 3:25 to play in the contest.

That would be as close as Sandwich would get as Hall (10-3) nailed 10 of 16 free throws late in the game to come away with the opening-round win.

The Indians were led in scoring by Tim Brann's 16-point effort, while Tre Miller and David Meyer added 10 and nine points, respectively for Sandwich.Noel Santiago headed the all scorers for Hall with 28 points, while Ben Miklavcic chipped in nicely with 17 for the Red Devils.

"There's no doubt Hall has a very well-balanced team and they play very well together and that was obvious today," said Sandwich coach Scott Bantz. "All in all, it was a positive effort and a positive start to the tournament against a quality opponent. But we want to get into the win column soon. We don't want to just keep getting better, we want to win these games. Hopefully we can get it done early on Saturday."