Boys Basketball: Kenny Obendorf carries Metea Valley past Rolling Meadows in OT

Updated: December 28, 2011 10:13PM

Unbeaten Metea Valley hadn’t played a lot of extremely close games, but the inexperience didn’t affect the Mustangs one bit Wednesday when Rolling Meadows hung tough in overtime at the Hinsdale South Christmas tournament.

Metea Valley went offensively with what worked earlier in the game and got the big three-pointer from Kenny Obendorf, then simply tightened up the defense at the other end and pulled out a 69-64 overtime win.

“We’ve had a couple close ones, but that was the closest and it was good experience for us having to execute down the stretch and get some big stops on defense,” said Obendorf, the Mustangs’ 6-foot-2 senior center.

With the score tied at 62 in overtime and just under two minutes remaining, the Mustangs (12-0) set up a play for Obendorf to shoot a three-pointer from the corner. He hit nothing but net and Rolling Meadows (7-5) never recovered.

“He’s been doing it all year for us,” Metea Valley coach Bob Vozza said. “He’s our leader. We’ve got some sets for him to get the ball in those situation and he hits the shots.”

Obendorf finished with a team-high 20 points, including 12 in the third quarter when he helped Metea rally from a 39-30 deficit. He hit three three-pointers that quarter, including two from the side, and then the fourth three-pointer in OT.

“We ran that play in the corner a few times earlier in the game and didn’t execute, even though we got the basket, but we were able to execute it perfectly at the end,” Obendorf said.

After the key three-pointer made it 65-62, Rolling Meadows’ missed three-pointer led to two foul shots at the other end by Metea Valley’s Ryan Solomon, who had 12 points.

The 67-62 lead with 38 seconds left looked enough, but a turnover gave Rolling Meadows the chance at a tying three-pointer after two free throws by Michael Rose (rose points) had made it 67-64. But Metea’s TreSean Mackey tied up the ball and the possession arrow favored Metea Valley, depriving Rolling Meadows of the chance at the game-tying shot.

With 9.5 seconds left, Mackey iced the win with two free throws.

“Our program is only three years old and we’ve tried to build it on defense, and defense is going to win big ballgames and carry us through the year,” Vozza said. “So we bear down when we need to and we got the stops.”

Lashawn Cargo had all eight of his points in the third quarter, including two three-pointers, to assist Metea’s rally from a nine-point deficit. Sean Davis had 14 points for the Mustangs, who made 26-of-58 (45 percent) from the field.

Rolling Meadows had a game-high 22 from Tyler Gaedele, but he was held to three in the fourth quarter and two in overtime.

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