Rebound, rebound, rebound.
It was a word that had a double meaning Friday night for Naperville Central.
On a Friday night where baskets were hard to come by, the Redhawks owned the glass against host Naperville North for a tough 44-40 DuPage Valley Conference victory.
in front of a large-and-loud crowd, Matthew Meier scored 12 of his game-high 17 points in the second half as Naperville Central (14-10, 4-3) avenged a 52-46 loss to Naperville North in December.
“When they came into our place it was devastating, and we had all the fans so it was a tough loss,” he said “Coming into here, there’s no feeling like it. It’s the best part about playing basketball. We got great support from our fans and got the win that we really needed.”
Naperville Central outrebounded the Huskies 34-19 and seized control late in the fourth quarter.
Meier’s layup with 2:58 remaining gave the Redhawks a 34-31 lead. He missed a chance at a three-point play, but an offensive rebound ultimately resulted in Alex Pomeroy getting fouled and making two free throws to extend the lead to 36-31.
“We talked all week about how we have to outrebound them and keep them off the boards,” Central coach Peter Kramer said. “The kids just wanted it and you could tell with how they played.”
The Redhawks could’ve sealed the game at the free-throw line, but they shot just 2-for-10 during the final minute which gave the Huskies (11-9, 5-3) hope.
Hardy pulled the Huskies to within 43-40 by converting the first of two free throws with 3.6 seconds left. He intentionally missed the second, hoping for a long carom and a potential game-tying three-point try, but it didn’t work and they had to foul Mark Nowak.
Nowak missed his first attempt, but calmly sank the second one.
Said Kramer: “I told Nowak if you miss the last one, I might collapse.”
Naperville North had the crowd in the frenzy just before halftime after Cam Hardy connected with Deon Merrill for an alley-oop dunk that gave the Huskies a 19-15 advantage at the break, but it wouldn’t last.
“The way they came out in the third quarter, they kind of took all the intensity back from us after we had that big play,” Huskies coach Jeff Powers said. “They got ahead and I think that fueled them, and we did a horrible job of rebounding and getting the 50-50 balls.”
Baylor Griffin and Cam Hardy led the Huskies with 11 points each. Chris Gajcak added nine points off the bench, while Griffin earned seven rebounds. Standout sophomore Mitch Lewis didn’t play and will miss four games due to violating a team policy.
“Our best player was (in) the dog pound today,” Powers said. “They were really good. Cam Hardy was pretty good too, but other than that we were outplayed all the way around.”
Hallstrom added 11 points and seven rebounds for the Redhawks while Nate Dahl had eight points and six rebounds and Pomeroy collected six rebounds.
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“I’m so proud of the kids,” Kramer said. “Harry kept his composure and made some big baskets and battled for rebounds, and I think Pomeroy played his best game of the year, just being ready to play and being a senior.”
Chris R. Walker is a freelance writer.