Their itineraries may vary, but Mike Hart and Juvon McGarry definitely have the same travel plans.
”He promised me when he was a freshman and we went to Champaign that we`d be back,” said Hart, the Evanston basketball coach. ”He kept his promise.”
”Disney World,” said McGarry, the Wildkits` junior forward. ”We`re going to Disney World.”
Indeed, being among the Elite Eight that will make the trek Downstate to this year`s Class AA basketball finals is a trip. Evanston earned its way Tuesday night with a 66-61 victory over Warren in the Elgin supersectional.
McGarry`s 32 points definitely helped Evanston (25-5) hold off tough Warren (24-6). His 17 rebounds aided immeasurably.
”And I had a sore throat all night,” McGarry said with a smile. ”We had a hard game, harder than we thought it would be. They didn`t look too tough, but what you see on TV and what you get on the court can be two different things.”
Hart got two different halves from his Wildkits.
”We knew we had to get off the boards the entire game,” he said. ”We had to win the fight for the glass. We came out hard and played our game well in the first half, but something changed in the second.”
That something was Warren forward Dave Nolan, who scored 25 points, 23 in the second half. Nolan scored 15 of Warren`s 22 points in the third quarter.
”We didn`t say we wanted to go to him in the second half,” said Warren coach Darrel Bader. ”He just got the ball and took over. He wanted it and got it.”
”That kid shot the lights out in the second half,” Hart said. ”We tried three kids on him and nothing worked. We tried guys with different size, style and quickness. He just kept throwing them in. We never counted on that.”
Warren cut an 11-point Evanston lead late in the second quarter to 52-51 with 5 minutes 55 seconds left in the fourth.
”At that point, we thought we were going to win the game,” Bader said.
”But Evanston was tough. In the first half, I think our kids were giving them too much respect. We came out tentative. In the second half, we started going to the body. I told our guys to look them in the eye and say, `I`m good enough, too.` ”
Hart`s team led 36-23 at the half, and he was happy he had a good enough first half to make up for the second.
”We started by playing aggressive, getting fast breaks and controlling the boards,” he said. ”The second half was different. Let`s face it: You`re not going to get too many fast breaks when you don`t get rebounds. When you have a kid (Nolan) go 8 of 9 in one stretch, you`re not going to get rebounds.”
