Web Extra!
Despite a glittering record with just one defeat, the Riverside-Brookfield High School boys basketball team still had plenty of doubters before Tuesday night.
Some wondered if the Bulldogs had defeated a really good team all season. Well the Bulldogs answered the doubters Tuesday night, defeating area-ranked Morton 59-57 in a non-conference game before a big and loud home crowd.
“Now people are not going to take us lightly,” said senior forward Shane Kilcoyne who scored 18 points and grabbed 12 rebounds. “They know who we are now. This was the biggest game of the year for us. We were pumped. We played hard the whole game.”
Guard Sean McGonagill, who had an outstanding game with 17 points and five assists, said the game answered any doubters.
“It was kind of like a big statement game,” McGonagill said. “A lot of teams doubt us and they don’t think anything of us.”
Shane Kilcoyne and his twin brother, Anthony Kilcoyne, took turns guarding Morton’s Raul Guzman, a 6-foot 4-inch, 240-pound forward. They held Guzman to just eight points and seven rebounds. The Kilcoynes also got Guzman in foul trouble, and Guzman eventually fouled out with 1:44 to play after sitting out more than four minutes in the fourth quarter with four fouls.
“He’s a big, tough kid, physical,” Shane Kilcoyne said.
Before the game Kilcoyne knew he was in for a tough match up.
“Before the game, coach, everybody, said I would have to step up and I stepped up tonight so it feels real good,” Kilcoyne said.
RB (19-1) led 30-27 at the half and started the third quarter with back-to-back three pointers by McGonagill and Ryan Jackson, who played despite battling the flu.
Morton (16-5), which was without 6-8 star center Luke Scarlata who is recovering from an appendectomy, stayed close for a while, but the Bulldogs went on a 7-0 run keyed by a three pointer from Derek Tomasek to open up a 45-35 lead with 1:48 left in the third quarter.
The Bulldogs led by eight points entering the fourth quarter.
Billy VandeMerkt (9 points, 5 assists) scored on a layup following a big block from Shane Kilcoyne to put RB seemingly comfortably ahead 54-46 with 3:28 left in the game.
But the Bulldogs had trouble putting the game away, because of problems at the free throw line.
Twice they missed front ends of one-and-one free throw opportunities and Morton clawed back to within two points when Joe Belcaster (16 points) scored on a drive with 58 seconds remaining.
But Jackson quickly found Shane Kilcoyne underneath the basket for a layup to put the Bulldogs up 57-53 with 48 second left.
Belcaster cut the margin to two when he scored on a nifty scoop shot with 36 seconds left. He was fouled on the basket but missed the free throw that would have cut the margin to one.
With 25 seconds left McGonagill made two free throws to give RB a 59-55 lead. Morton’s Oscar Macias (10 points) scored with 18 seconds left to make the score 59-57.
McGonagill again was fouled with 16 seconds left, but this time the junior guard missed both free throws. But Morton couldn’t take advantage as the Mustangs promptly turned the ball over on a bad pass with 12 seconds left.
With 6 seconds left Shane Kilcoyne was fouled, but he too missed both free throws, giving Morton one last chance to tie or win.
But the Bulldogs played tough defense and Macias missed on a 16-foot off-balance jumper at the buzzer that would have sent the game into overtime.
With that the RB student section, known as the sixth man, stormed the court and mobbed the Bulldogs.