Crystal Lake South had a scoring spurt.

It needed a growth spurt.

The Gators got an immediate taste of Benet’s front line featuring 7-foot-1 Colin Stack and 6-8 Edvardas Stasys on Monday night in the Day 2 finale of Jacobs’ Hinkle Holiday Classic. Then once the Redwings started draining 3-pointers, their winning recipe was complete.

Benet hit 13 of 30 shots (43%) from beyond the arc and pulled away for a 66-30 win. Redwings guard Jayden Wright sank all four of his 3-pointers in the second half en route to a 16-point effort, while Stasys had 14 points, including five dunks. He threw down three two-handed slams in the first quarter.

“He’s a freak around the rim,” said Benet senior guard Ryan Walsh, who scored nine points on three 3-pointers coming off the bench.

Stack, who committed to North Dakota State in November, buried a 3-pointer as well.

“He can make a three-point shot,” Benet coach Gene Heidkamp said of his senior center. “He’s green-lighted if he’s out there and he’s open. He doesn’t shoot the volume the other guys do, but he’s probably a 40% three-point shooter.”

Benet (11-1), which has won eight games in a row, advances to Tuesday’s 6 p.m. winners-bracket game against Barrington (6-4). South (6-6), which saw its three-game winning streak end, plays Larkin (5-7) at 3 p.m. Tuesday.

South used a 9-0 run by Carson Trivellini (game-high 17 points) to pull even at 21-all with 1:23 left in the first half. But Aidan Renicker and Ethan MacDermot answered with back-to-back 3s to give the lead back to Benet for good and send the Redwings into halftime up 27-21.

Noah Cook’s 3-pointer and two-handed breakaway dunk early in the second quarter helped South dig out of a 16-4 hole after one quarter.

“I think we felt good about [the first half],” Gators coach Matt LePage said. “[Benet] played with a different speed in the second half. You got to get off to a good start in the third quarter. I thought we were in a good spot, but then they made some shots, we missed some coverages, missed some block-outs, and the next thing you know you’re down 15, 20 [points], chasing. Their shot-making was incredible.”

The Redwings blew the game open in the third quarter, starting with a one-handed flush by Stasys, who added a layup to end a 10-0 run with 3:23 left in the third. Trivellini’s basket on the baseline accounted for South’s first points of the half, before the Redwings responded with an 11-0 run.

“We shot it much better in the second half,” said Heidkamp, whose team made 10 3-pointers after halftime. “The first half, their defense caused us a lot of problems. I thought we played very tentatively, and I give [South] credit for that.”

Six Redwings made at least one 3-pointer. Walsh and MacDermot (11 points) each hit two 3s in the third, and Wright made one, helping Benet extend its lead to 48-25 entering the final quarter.

“It definitely helped,” Walsh said of Benet’s multiple contributors from three-point range. “It broke the game open. We haven’t been shooting the best this year either, so it was big to make some [3s].”

While Stack scored only seven points, his length played a big part in shutting down South’s inside game. He blocked three shots, altered several others and grabbed six rebounds.

“I’ve always been tall, the tallest on the court, and then the guy who’s 7-1, it was just hard to get up shots today,” said Jacobs’ 6-7 sophomore John Morgan, who had five points, including a 3-pointer, coming off the bench. “Usually it’s easy for me to see the rim, but when [Stack] put a hand up, it was hard to make shots. I tried my best, though.”

Benet’s man-to-man defense held South to only four points in the third quarter and five in the fourth, which saw a running clock start when Stack’s 3 made the score 60-30.

“Our defense was really the key for us,” Heidkamp said. “We were able to get stops, and that allowed us to play more in transition and less of the half-court game.”