LZHS boys’ varsity basketball team lost their season opener against Lake Forest Academy 42-47. The team gained many opportunities to take hold of a lead, but execution issues held them back. Lake Zurich had many positive and negative takeaways from their opening performance. With the Bears playing an aggressive, tough and gritty style of play.
The Bears dominated the glass, outrebounding their much taller opponents, securing a lot of offensive rebounds in the first half to keep their offensive possessions going. Terry Coughlin, head coach of the men’s varsity basketball team, gives his thoughts on the performance they had.
“We played really hard for 32 minutes. We dominated the glass and didn’t turn over very much…really, we got to make free throws,” Coughlin said.
The Bears didn’t have the greatest shooting from the charity stripe. Although it is a good sign that they shot 21 free throws, which means they drew 11 fouls as they weren’t fouled on 3 point shots, making only 12/21 is around 57%. If the bears want to keep up this production and keep drawing fouls from inside the paint, then they have to be making free throws comfortably above 50% to be converting these chances for free points, otherwise they will be struggling offensively if shots don’t open up from outside the paint. However, a lot of players had gotten their first varsity minutes this game, including a Freshman who got his first varsity start for the opening game.
“We’ll execute better. We had a lot of younger guys out there playing that got their first varsity minutes …I think it’s just really cleaning up a lot of it. Free throws, especially, but cleaning up a lot of things from the execution perspective,” Coughlin said.
The Bears played a very aggressive style of play in the opening season with a plethora of new additions to the starting varsity lineup. Veterans of the team in Adrian Riep, Kain Kretschmar and Reid Pfeifer were all quick to the floor, winning many loose ball possessions over Lake Forest Academy, and overall outhustling them within the first and second half. Many of these possessions would then lead to Lake Zurich drawing fouls, which would then lead them to getting to the free throw line.
“I think it’s just really cleaning up a lot of it. Free throws, especially, but cleaning up a lot of things from an execution perspective… I think overall, a pretty good start for us in a lot of ways,” Coughlin said.
The Bears aggressive play and attacking the basket lead them to many opportunities to take a lead within the game, as they trailed for nearly all of the game. Going into the half, they only had 18 points, but at the end of the game they had 42, scoring 6 more points than they did in the first half. The senior players also showed up big for the bears, with seniors Kain Kretschmar and Adrian Riep both scoring in double digits, with Adrian Riep having 8 points at halftime. Kretschmar drew multiple shooting fouls down the stretch, hitting big shots and drawing charges that gave the Bears a chance to take over this game. Adrian Riep gives his thoughts about the season opener after the game.
“You know, the season opener is always a surprise coming out…we have our own injuries coming in early. Starting with a little less experience this year…I think it was a good opening. We showed a lot of promise…we’ll just figure it out, we’ll build up from here…but we can be better than that.” Riep said.
Riep sums up perfectly how this season opener went in the eyes of the team. A good result that just had a bit of rough edges, when those edges are polished, the scoreboard will start to favor Lake Zurich. Not every team can win their first game, but every team has the ability to build off of their first games and first losses in order to be better. In fact, the bears did end up bouncing back, winning their next 2 games against Niles West and Chicago Mt. Carmel by comfortable margins in both games. These results showed improvement by the Bears, with this momentum hopefully carrying further into the season.
“That’s a big team that we outrebounded, so that’s a big positive…we also shot 21 free throws, which tells that we were aggressive and attacked the paint, attacked the glass…we also played a lot of guys, which is good…so I think we’ll get a better role definition, get guys more comfortable, some of that is experience…So I think as that improves, we get more of that…experience is the best teacher,” Coughlin said.
