South Elgin’s Sean Harvey did his best to mentally prepare for this season, knowing that every situation he might encounter on the court would be a new experience.
Harvey is one of five seniors who sat behind a veteran starting lineup last season, so the lanky 6-foot-8 forward knew his life on the varsity was about to change.
“I knew it was something I couldn’t wait to get used to,” Harvey said. “I knew I had to get into that mindset early on. It’s definitely an adjustment.
“Coach told us early in the season, you guys pretty much didn’t see any playing time last year. You’re going to get scouted for the first time.”
Harvey gave the scouts something to talk about Tuesday night for the host Storm during a 61-60 Upstate Eight Conference loss to Fenton.
Putting together one of the best performances of his burgeoning career, Harvey ended up 9-for-16 from the field and scored a team-high 22 points for South Elgin (6-6, 5-1).
Harvey, who missed parts of the fourth quarter with leg cramps, shot 2 of 5 from 3-point range. He showed off an array of moves in the high post, working a midrange game and even getting into the lane for a dunk.
“We knew what they were going to give us so we had a game plan going into it,” Harvey said. “I knew I was going to get some looks. I just had to make sure I stepped up and capitalized on them.”
South Elgin trailed 53-44 going into the fourth quarter.
The Storm opened the fourth on an 11-0 run, however, clamping down on defense to the point that Fenton (9-3, 6-0) was held scoreless until the 2:45 mark as South Elgin took a 55-53 lead.
Harvey started the rally with a layup. Shailen Shukti followed with a 3-pointer and Elias Cole-Williams hit a pair of free throws. Then the defense started to pay off.
After forcing only two turnovers the first three quarters, the Storm grabbed a 55-53 lead as Victor Sison and Shukti scored on consecutive layups off steals. Sisson finished with 16 points.
“I thought we struggled early with on-ball defense,” South Elgin coach Philip Church said. “We got beat to the basket pretty easily. The guys stepped up in the second half, took the challenge and did a better job.”
Harvey forced a 57-57 tie on a jumper from the wing with 1:04 left. Fenton responded with four points in the final minute to push the lead to 61-57.
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hit a 3-pointer with two seconds left to cut the deficit to one, but the Storm were out of timeouts and time expired.“That is the learning piece with those guys,” Church said. “We can’t just be bailed out by a timeout like you did in a JV game or a sophomore game a few years ago. It doesn’t quite work like that anymore.”
That’s what Harvey took out of the tough loss.
“It’s all about experience, really,” Harvey said. “It’s not about that last possession. It’s about finding different possessions every quarter.
“Coach always says win by two possessions every quarter and that’s a double-digit win. We’ll look at some film and find where we can get those possessions.”
South Elgin plays Fremd on Thursday, weather permitting, before heading next week to the Hinkle Holiday Classic at Jacobs.
Harvey hopes the Storm can find some answers.
“It’s going to be a lot of stuff, just seeing what did we prepare for, did we execute and what can we do next time?” Harvey said. “A lot of that is applying ourselves in practice and in game prep.
“We’re not used to it yet. Once we adjust to this new high-level game we’ll be a lot more prepared.”
Paul Johnson is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.