Ethan Vahl lingered in the gym long after Saturday’s game was over, posing with family and friends in front of a huge sign recognizing his 1,000-point achievement.

It’s a milestone many high school players celebrate. Few do so before the conclusion of their sophomore season.

But Vahl, Oswego’s sophomore point guard, hit 1,000 in January.

He was recognized for it in a pregame ceremony.

“It’s exciting,” Vahl said. “Not a lot of sophomores usually get this opportunity. I’m blessed.”

Oswego, too, is in rarefied air these days.

The Panthers scored the first 10 points of Saturday’s game with Yorkville, and never trailed.

Vahl scored a game-high 21 points, and Oswego beat visiting Yorkville 56-43 for its 11th win in 12 games.

Oswego (19-8, 10-4 Southwest Prairie Conference), whose last winning season was six years ago, is at its most wins since the 2015-2016 season, the program’s last regional champion.

“We’ve been playing as a team a lot lately, really together,” Vahl said. “I trust my teammates and they trust me. We’ve been on a roll.”

That roll seemed to start with Oswego’s win over Oswego East at the beginning of January.

But really, it traces back to getting football players like starters Mariano Velasco and Graham Schwab back in December. They bring a toughness to the team, and make winning plays. Sophomore Cole Jansons and junior Niko Jurkovic are posts that have improved as the season progressed.

The Panthers were all over the Foxes from the start, jumping out to leads of 10-0 and 16-4 after a quarter.

Velasco, Brayden Borrowman and Jansons each scored seven points for Oswego.

“It took a while for those football guys to get acclimated. The kids are buying in and playing hard,” Oswego coach Nike Oraham said. “That was one of the more complete games we have played from a toughness standpoint. We did a nice job rebounding, anticipating passing lanes, sharing the ball.”

Gabe Sanders scored 13 points and Joey Jakstys had 12 points and seven rebounds for Yorkville (13-11, 9-5).

It was a disastrous start for the Foxes, who didn’t score for almost six minutes and had four players pick up two fouls in the first quarter.

“It could not go worse,” Yorkville coach John Holakovsky said. “I think we had eight straight turnovers to start the game. We had one shot for about six minutes. We didn’t come ready to compete at the defensive end and we couldn’t get the ball in the paint.”

Vahl scored 10 of his 21 points in the first quarter. He only shot 2-for-9 from the 3-point line, but even when his shooting is off he brings so much more to Oraham’s Oswego team.

“Ethan is a huge part of what we do. Nice to have a guy that when things are breaking down we can get the ball in his hands and there is a sense of calmness that we can still get a decent shot up,” Oraham said. “Saw his first three go down, that always helps. A couple out there that he probably wishes and knows should go down.”

Yorkville, down 11 at half, closed to within 30-24 on a Nate Kubin basket. But Jakstys was whistled for his third and fourth fouls in less than a minute.

“We were running our offense through him and then all of a sudden we get two fouls that were 50/50. That’s the way it goes,” Holakovsky said. “We got to start better. Tough weekend for us. Both games [a loss to Oswego East Friday, and Saturday’s game] started off similar. Back to the drawing board.”

Oswego, with the win, evened the season series. Yorkville beat Oswego 46-43 in December, the first week the football players were back.

“To me, all games are personal, we take this one to heart,” Vahl said. “They are technically our rivals. We want to win this one.”

“We didn’t get into a rhythm and that’s a credit to them,” Holakovsky said. “It’s a lot better team than when we saw them in December.”

It’s an Oswego team that looks to be positioning itself for a good sectional seed that comes out Thursday.

“We lost to Downers Grove South, they’re probably going to be four but I think we should be five,” Oraham said. “We’ve beaten Naperville North, we beat Metea, we beat Waubonsie, we have beaten Oswego East, all the Plainfields, got the most recent one with Yorkville. Some of our losses were early on with the football players.”