Boys Basketball: Yorkville hitting the road for playoffs, aiming for first regional title in nearly 20 years

Yorkville is a 25-win top-four sectional seed enjoying the program’s best season in nearly 20 years. One more win, and the Foxes match a school record for wins.

But they’ll have a two-hour drive each way to get it.

In the current IHSA postseason setup with preset regional hosts and Yorkville’s geographical location, the Foxes will be making a Wednesday night drive for a regional semifinal to face regional host Pekin, a team with a 12-16 record.

Win there, and it’s another two-hour drive back to Pekin two nights later.

“Obviously it’s not what we want, it’s not what we look for, but at the end of the day I did some complaining about a month ago when I saw that would happen, but the last couple weeks I haven’t thought about it too much,” Yorkville coach John Holakovsky said. “I told my assistants and the kids if we keep driving two-plus hours, that means we’re still winning.

“I want as many of those drives as possible. I told them we worked too hard for four months to worry about this. I’ll drive six hours if we can get a playoff win.”

Yorkville (25-5) certainly carries momentum into the playoffs. The Foxes wrapped up their regular season with perhaps their best win of the season, an 11-point victory at Lincoln-Way East, itself a top-four sectional seed. Jason Jakstys, who earned his first Division I scholarship Thursday from Illinois State, had 13 points and five rebounds in the win.

“It was a big-time win, the momentum we were looking for,” Holakovsky said. “My main message was let’s not make this the best memory we had in February or March.”

With a win Wednesday, Yorkville would play the East Moline-Normal winner in Friday’s regional final at Pekin for the program’s first regional title since 2005.

Advance beyond that, and it’s likely a sectional semifinal with Moline and Iowa recruits Owen Freeman and Brock Harding at Wharton Fieldhouse in Moline.

“We’re trying to do some things that haven’t been done in a while, everybody is aware of it. At the same time it’s hard to look ahead,” Holakovsky said. “It’s hard to look ahead to two playoff wins when I haven’t got one as a head coach. Our focus has to be Pekin.”

Elsewhere, Oswego East (25-5) is the No. 3 seed at the Class 4A Bolingbrook Sectional and opens regional play at Lockport on Wednesday against Lincoln-Way West.

The Wolves, led by Towson recruit Mekhi Lowery, ride a seven-game winning streak into the postseason and completed a second straight 16-0 run through the Southwest Prairie Conference. And Oswego East seems to be peaking at the right time, with double-digit road wins at Yorkville and Oswego the last two weeks.

“It’s exactly what we want – we want to be clicking at the right time,” Oswego East coach Ryan Velasquez said. “It’s a clean slate now, 0-0, win and advance, and you have to be playing at your best this time of year, because everybody wants the same thing.”

Oswego East is seeking to reach its second consecutive sectional final. To get there, should the Wolves win Wednesday, they’d have to beat Lockport on its home floor in a regional final or beat West Aurora for the fourth time this year.

The sectional, to be held at Bolingbrook, lines up as one of the best in the state should the top four seeds advance. Joliet West, led by Michigan State recruit Jeremy Fears Jr., is the top seed, followed by Bolingbrook, Oswego East and Lincoln-Way East.

“Can’t overlook anybody, one game at a time, rep after rep, and all attention is on Lincoln-Way West,” Velasquez said. “If all those top four seeds get through, that’s a monster of a sectional.”

Oswego (15-15), seeded 10th in the sectional, has a regional semifinal rematch next Wednesday at eighth Waubonsie Valley (14-15), the winner likely to face Bolingbrook. Waubonsie beat Oswego 53-39 Dec. 3, but the Panthers were without leading scorer Max Niesman in the game.

“Obviously I think we’re a lot better comparatively to that game,” Oswego coach Chad Pohlmann said. “Watching the tape of the game, it was [sophomore] Dasean [Patton’s] third or fourth varsity game, [freshman] Jayden [Riley’s] third or fourth varsity game – for those younger guys that was early on in the season. We take some resolve that they won the ballgame, but we were still figuring some things out, Max didn’t play, and it was 42-37 with two or three minutes left, and we had the ball.”

Oswego has indeed played its best basketball during the season’s stretch run. The Panthers are 9-2 over their last 11 games. Patton has come into his own during that stretch, averaging close to 20 points per game.

“At this point and time in the year, anything can happen in these tournament games,” Pohlmann said. “You have to do all the little things better than the other team. They’re going to be ready, they’ll have scouted and prepped. It will come down to who can handle the mental side.”

In Class 2A, Sandwich (19-12) finds itself at the opposite end of the spectrum from a year ago, when the Indians went 1-29. This time it’s Sandwich that will be hosting 1-30 Marengo in a regional quarterfinal Saturday. The winner will face Aurora Christian on Wednesday at Genoa-Kingston.

“It’s weird how it works – we had one win last year going into Genoa-Kingston, who was the five seed, and we almost beat them, lost by two,” Sandwich coach Kevin Kozan said. “I tell the guys everybody in the playoffs is 0-0, you can throw everything out the window. The pressure is different, the atmosphere is different.

“We have to stick to what we do best, and we have to guard.”

That defense indeed has been the calling card for one of the best turnaround stories around. Sandwich allows just 48 points per game, best in the Interstate 8 Conference. The Indians wrapped up second place in the league with a 54-36 win over Ottawa a night after an impressive win over an Ottawa Marquette team that is a Class 1A No. 1 sectional seed. Sandwich has won six of its last seven games since losing six of eight to start January.

“Every team goes through something like that over the course of the season, but I thought we learned from it,” Kozan said. “We just continue to guard. I’m proud of them.”

In Class 1A, defending state champion Yorkville Christian is certainly flying under the radar with a 9-21 record and a fifth seed in Sub-Sectional A at the Putnam County Sectional.

But don’t overlook the Mustangs just yet.

Should Yorkville Christian get by a regional quarterfinal with Fenger on Saturday, it would likely face Putnam County, which beat the Mustangs in overtime in December in a game in which Yorkville Christian led in the final seconds of regulation. Yorkville Christian also owns an 83-80 win over No. 1 sectional seed Ottawa Marquette on its ledger.

“It’s not going to be easy, but there is a path,” Yorkville Christian coach Aaron Sovern said. “We’re definitely not backing down. From Day 1, we said our goal was to win another state title.”

Yorkville Christian will of course lean heavily on the talents of senior guard David Douglas Jr. The state’s leading scorer according to Max Preps at 34.4 points per game has twice set a school record for points in a game this year, most recently 66 on Feb. 7 against Bloomington.

“We’ve changed some defenses, and the kids have been locked in,” Sovern said. “Offensively we’re knocking down shots, and D.J. is scoring at a high level. I like where we are at.”

Newark hosts Henry-Senachwine in a 1A regional opener Saturday.

In Class 3A, Plano hosts IMSA on Saturday, the winner to face Marmion in a regional semifinal at Kaneland.