Jayden Riley’s career-high 39 points power Yorkville Christian past Hinckley-Big Rock at Plano Classic

PLANO – Noah Aguado is one of those players that makes an impact simply by his presence.

He plays alongside Jayden Riley, one of those players you talk about when you’re discussing the most talented point guards in the state.

Behind a career-high 39 points from Riley and 11 rebounds and 7 points from Aguado, Yorkville Christian overwhelmed Hinckley-Big Rock, 90-61, during Monday’s opening round game of the 61st annual Plano Christmas Classic.

“We’ve never had a kid (like Aguado) with that size in our school’s history,” Mustangs coach Aaron Sovern said. “6-6 and about 200 pounds and he just plays hard. He doesn’t need the ball offensively. We tell him if you want to get shots you got to go and get the rebound.”

Riley made 17-of-37 shots, including 4-of-10 three-pointers. He added four assists.

“He just controls the game,” Sovern said. “The ball is just an extension of him. He makes the right reads. He’s a very cerebral point guard. I always talk to him about (alumni) Tyler Burrows and Jaden Schutt running the point for us. He’s just a different kid. He’s a pure point guard who happens to be able to score.”

Riley can also deliver on the defensive end. He had four steals and six rebounds.

“It’s not just scoring because he’s had some huge assists in games, and that’s what he’d rather do,” Sovern said. “He would rather get 10 assists than 20 points, but he has to score for us. And that opens things up for our shooters, and that’s been the case the last handful of games where teams are game planning for him. They just look at his raw numbers and got to double him and now we’ve got everybody back from last year who is a year older. We have seniors now with experience.”

That includes Aguado.

“I’m just a big body, a presence mostly,” Aguado said. “I can make a basket. My free throw shooting (1-of-4) could be called unique since I shoot it with one hand. I only recently discovered doing it because I have large hands so I can palm the ball and just shoot it. I like being down in that post because that’s where I feel I can be more useful. I’m not a shooter so I’m not going to be outside. I’ll be inside the blocks, the lane and all the other stuff.”

Hinckley Big-Rock (7-2) got an easy basket from Alex Casanas off of a beautiful pass from Martin Ledbetter for pull within 52-47 with 2:23 remaining in the third quarter.

The Mustangs outscored the Royals, 28-8 in just under six minutes to break the game wide open. After Riley saved a rebound on the defensive end, he tossed a pass to Tray Alford. The sophomore fired the ball ahead to Zach Marini who received it in stride, but missed his initial shot. The senior stuck with it and grabbed his miss off the glass and put it in for an 80-55 lead with 4:42 still left to play.

“With the style we play everybody is going to get tired,” Riley said. “They were hanging with us, but then just got tired. I think the big dude (Ledbetter) got tired of running back and forth so we just kept going.”

Ledbetter paced the Royals with 21 points, 13 rebounds, four assists and two steals. Luke Nadal added 11 points and Max Hintzsche and Jacob Orin both had 10 points.

The Royals had won seven straight after losing their season-opener.

“I thought we played pretty well for most of the game,” Royals coach Seth Sanderson said. “Up until their run at the end of the third (quarter), beginning of the fourth (quarter), we matched their runs and we were able to counter their three-point shooting and transition by slowing down and attacking the paint.”

Yorkville Christian erupted for 57 points in the second half.

“Once they got rolling, we got sped up and they did a very good job of keeping that tempo,”Sanderson said. “(Jayden) Riley is such a great player. He can control games. Overall I was happy with the effort, but room to grow with finishing the ball and taking care of it.”

The Mustangs made 12-of-39 three-pointers while the Royals missed all 12 of their attempts. Turnovers played a huge factor with Hinckley-Big Rock committing 25 compared to 13 by Yorkville Christian.

“We knew we had a little more depth than they had,” Sovern said. “The type of tempo that we would like to play will tire teams out by the beginning of the fourth quarter and that showed a little bit right there. They had some turnovers that they didn’t have earlier.”

Marini had 14 points, Jordan Purvis had 10 points and Alford had nine points, five assists and four steals for the Mustangs.

“Tray (Alford) and Jordan (Purvis) said they’ve improved a lot but they’ve been like that since last year,” Riley said. “Especially Tray. He said he’s improved so much but he’s been like that since I’ve known him. He’s more comfortable and used to the speed. He knows how to play off of me and we can play off of each other.”