Senior Cameron Myre got Newark off to a fast start, Will Clausel and Dylan Patrick soon followed suit and the defense was outstanding throughout.
The result?
The Norseman bolted to a 20-3 lead after one quarter of Tuesday’s Class 1A Somonauk Sectional semifinal and then cruised to a 62-42 win over DePue.
Newark (26-4) advances to the 7 p.m. Friday title game against the winner of Wednesday’s semifinal between Aurora Christian and Annawan.
“He’s that kind of kid who can come out and hit four or five shots if he feels it and give you a nice cushion,” Newark coach Rick Tollefson said of Myre.
A 6-foot-7 wing with an accurate outside shot, Myre opened the game with a pair of 3-pointers and added a third before the first quarter ended. He had 15 of his team-high 17 points in the first half.
“We knew if we set the tone we could take the game in our control,” Myre said. “That was our game plan and I knew if I had some shots, I’d be a big part of that.
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“I definitely was feeling it. It felt good to hit that first three and took the pressure off right away. From there, it just carried over to the whole team.”
And the start for Newark was huge.
“I mean they had what, three points at the end of the first quarter?” Myre said. “We just took the energy out of them.”
Junior guard Eduardo Moreno, who led all scorers with 18 points, got DePue (26-4) on the board with a 3-pointer at 4:55 of the first quarter, but the Little Giants didn’t score the remainder of the quarter.
Myre added a pair of 18-foot jumpers and two free throws in the second quarter and Clausel began attacking the basket.
“When you have two guys trying to cover Cameron, it opens things up,” Patrick said. “Once he starts shooting like that, he’s hard to guard.”
Clausel scored five of his 12 points in the second quarter as the Norsemen extended the lead to 33-14 at halftime.
“Cam got us off to a great start and brought them out of their zone, which is what we wanted to do,” Clausel said. “From there it just got everybody in rhythm.”
Meanwhile, the Norsemen were giving DePue fits with a constantly changing defense, moving from a 3-2 zone to man-to-man to a trap variation off the 3-2.
“I know I hate it when other teams are constantly changing defenses,” Tollefson said. “We can be pretty disruptive with our defense. We have four or five sets we can go to.”
The teams played nearly even on the second half, with Newark holding a 29-28 edge over the third and fourth quarters.
Patrick helped wrap it up by scoring 11 of his 13 points in the fourth quarter and shooting 9-for-10 from the foul line.
“I work on free throws a lot and take a lot of pride in them,” Patrick said.
Twitter @RickArmstrong28