One can safely assume that Wheeling forward J.P. Calandra, who also plays on the Wildcats’ football squad, knows a hard hit when he feels one.
And anyone who witnessed the lick that Rolling Meadows guard Nick Troy laid on Calandra as he bore in alone on a breakaway in the opening minute of the final quarter with the Mustangs nursing a six-point lead knew it was a filling-loosener.
Calandra missed the first freebie, hit the second, then banked in a 6-footer on the ensuing inbounds play to cut Rolling Meadows’ lead in half.
Calandra didn’t miss again, hitting his last four shots from the floor en route to a game-high 23 points. His effort, coupled with a stifling zone defense that all but shut down the Mustangs’ Rob Garnes for the last quarter and a half, lifted Wheeling to a 60-52 victory.
In addition to Calandra’s output, Ray Grady had 14 points (including an impressive 10 of 13 showing at the free throw line) and David Gussis chipped in a dozen to go along with a game-high 11 rebounds, half of the Wildcats’ total.
Garnes had 17 through three quarters before Wheeling’s zone kicked in and allowed the explosive junior a single free throw in the final eight minutes. Troy scored 11, all in the second half.
The Mid-Suburban League crossover victory improves Wheeling, which shot 50 percent from the field and hit 20 of 25 free throws, to 8-4. Rolling Meadows slips to 7-5.
“That was one of the toughest wins we’ve had,” said Wheeling coach Pat Doyle. “Not just this season but since I’ve been here. It was ugly. The kids just couldn’t get in synch in the first half, yet they played well enough to be down only (27-19) at halftime. That was big.”
The Mustangs fashioned that lead on the strength of two 10-2 runs, one in each of the opening two quarters. After the Wildcats took an 8-7 lead on a Gussis’ 15-footer, Garnes and Mike Miller split the first eight points of a 10-2 spurt that gave the hosts a 17-12 lead after one period.
Four different Mustangs scored in the second 10-2 run that opened up Rolling Meadows’ largest lead of the evening at 27-16. But Wheeling came back and scored the last three points of the half and the first four of the third to pull within 27-23 with less than a minute gone in the third quarter.
Then came the Calandra collision. That series sparked a 13-2 Wheeling run that opened the fourth quarter. In the midst of that spurt Calandra flashed into the middle of the lane, took a pass from Grady and turned and dropped in a 16-footer to give the Wildcats a 44-43 lead, their first since 8-7 and one they would never relinquish.
Troy hit a three-pointer and added a pair of free throws with 3:20 left to pull Rolling Meadows within 50-48. But Grady nailed five of his nine fourth-quarter free throws down the stretch to ice the game.
