St. Charles North 68, Auburn 52: Auburn survived three close games at regionals.
At sectionals, however, the Knights’ luck ran out.
Auburn’s season ended Tuesday with a 68-52 loss to St. Charles North in the semifinals of the Class 4A Elgin Sectional.
After making big runs to win all three of their games at last week’s Guilford Regional, the Knights couldn’t make the same comeback against a strong shooting St. Charles North team.
“I thought for sure when we cut it back to 10 in that second half, OK, here we come,” Auburn coach Bryan Ott said. “I guess we just didn’t have one more comeback within us.”
The Knights (21-9) fell behind early in the first quarter when the Stars used an 18-3 run to take a 27-16 lead heading into the second. St. Charles North (22-8) went 6 for 6 in first-quarter 3-pointers and then added three more in the second quarter.
St. Charles North finished 8 for 10 in first-half threes.
“We saw the film of them, and we knew they were good shooters,” Auburn senior Darnell Van Vleet said. “But we didn’t know they would shoot that way.”
After trailing 45-26 at halftime, the Knights started to comeback with a 13-4 run in the third. Auburn forced seven St. Charles North turnovers and had key 3-pointers from Kashif Maxwell and Van Vleet. A put back and free throw by Van Vleet ended the scoring in the third and pulled Auburn within 10 points (49-39) heading into the fourth.
But that’s as close as the Knights came.
“It just never happened,” Ott said. “Obviously we’re really hurting right now. The way they started off on fire like that made it tough for us, and I thought we lost our composure in the second quarter.”
The Knights committed just five turnovers compared with North’s 18, but Auburn shot just 28 percent in field goals compared with North’s 55 percent. Auburn also struggled at the free-throw line, finishing 9 for 19.
Center Ayrryous Ford finished with a team-high 15 points and eight rebounds. Van Vleet had 12 points and eight rebounds, and Maxwell had three 3-pointers and 14 points. Cortavien Wiggins and Van Vleet had three steals apiece.
Nick Neari’s 22 points and 3 for 4 night from 3-point range led the Stars.
All of this year’s starters will graduate, but the Auburn sophomores finished the season undefeated.
Auburn finished the season with its first regional championship since 1992-93 and a second-place finish in the NIC-10.
“We played as hard as we could,” said Ford, one of seven seniors on this year’s roster. “But we came a long way in the last two years, so we’re happy for that.”
- Emily Tropp, rrstar.com
