Boys basketball: Sycamore falls on road to Yorkville

YORKVILLE – Mason Klaas walked out of the Yorkville locker room with a slight limp, but insisted he's OK.

The Foxes could use good vibes.

Klaas, a senior guard, gave them a shot of it Friday.

Three days after getting blown out of their gym by Lockport, a day after teammate Jake Polowy had season-ending shoulder surgery, Klaas's 18 points led a gritty Yorkville 42-32 win over Sycamore in its Northern Illinois Big 12 East home opener.

Sycamore (4-5, 1-1), meanwhile, was a bit on its heels early Friday. Which, all things considered, was understandable.

Spartans' freshman coach Daryl Graves got the call at 2:30 p.m. that head coach Ryan Picolotti would not make the trip because of an unspecified medical condition.

The bus left at 3:30 p.m.

"It was kind of a sudden thing, we just kind of put everything together at the last second," said Graves, who was scheduled to coach the freshmen in Oregon. "We were pretty much scrambling right after school to figure out the best way to handle things. It was a little crazy."

Zac Konecny added 10 points for Yorkville (4-5, 1-1) which never trailed after jumping out to a 13-0 start. Grant McConkey led Sycamore with nine points.

Sycamore, for its part, came right back to close to 13-11 on a De'Shaun Harris 3-pointer. Konecny's buzzer-beating 3-pointer sent Yorkville into halftime ahead 22-16, but a score by Jason Hayes had the Spartans within 24-18 until another Konecny three got the margin back to nine. Sycamore, despite Jackson Johnson's five points and seven rebounds, never got closer.

"For our kids to come back and play hard, we're extremely proud," Graves said.

The tone was set in the game's first minute.

Yorkville's Chase DiVito dove to the court for a loose ball, forcing a tie-up and turnover. Klaas followed suit, and it was contagious.

"We definitely played with a fire in our butt," Klaas said.

The Foxes can relate to freelancing with unforeseen circumstances.

Polowy, with Klaas their two top returners, was lost to a torn labrum suffered during football season. Jimmy Eberhart, another returning senior, tore his rotator cuff the second game.

"You talk about losing absolutely two key kids, but you have to move on," said Foxes coach Mike Dunn.

It helps to have Klaas play in the manner he did Friday.

On three occasions in the first quarter, he drove hard to the rim, absorbed contact and finished at the rim. He kept doing it too, twice converting three-point plays.

"Conference home opener, they're going to be physical, we're going to be physical, we're going to do whatever we can to win," said Klaas, who scored 13 of his 19 points in the first half. "Scraping our elbow, diving on the floor for a loose ball, so be it."