Sports
Boys Basketball: End of the Road for Boatright, Tomcats
Glenbard East 80, East Aurora 62. East Aurora's run ends in the sectional finals, wrapping up the stellar four-year career of Ryan Boatright.
AURORA – With his standout high school career just having ended steps away from the locker room, East Aurora senior Ryan Boatright donned a symbol of his future Friday.
The Tomcats’ season, and Boatright’s electrifying career, had just ended with an 80-62 loss to Glenbard East in the Class 4A East Aurora Sectional title game. Boatright addressed the media in a UConn T-shirt, where he hopes to write the next chapter of his career, while still processing the end of this stanza.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Boatright said. “I feel it now. I loved my career here. I felt like I had a great career here, a lot of great teammates. I’m from the east side of Aurora, and I’ll never forget where I came from.”
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As usual, Boatright did his best to deliver a win for the Tomcats (24-6). He snatched the ball off the opening tip and flew in for a dunk, which was followed by a pair of John Williams three-pointers with Boatright being hounded defensively to open a stunning 8-0 lead, prompting a Glenbard East timeout.
The Rams (26-3) countered, however. They answered with a 13-0 run keyed by two Zach Miller three-pointers that got Glenbard East right back into the flow of the game.
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“We knew they were going to come out and punch,” Miller said. “I mean, for their seniors, this is the last time on this court. The atmosphere was nuts. We knew deep down that we’d be able to take the punch and come back and give them a good shot, and that’s what we did.”
The run that followed the timeout lingered for the Rams, however. They hit all five of their three-point attempts in the second quarter, and went 8-of-12 from beyond the arc in the half. By the time halftime hit, Glenbard East had a 37-24 lead, meaning that following the Tomcats’ quick start, the Rams ripped off a 37-16 run the rest of the way.
“We knew they were good, but I think we relaxed a little bit,” East Aurora coach Wendell Jeffries said of his team, which was coming off an upset of top-ranked Benet Tuesday. “When you lose your focus, that’s when you give up wide-open shots. That’s what happened in the first half, they hit wide-open shots and that got them on a run. I think that was the difference in the ballgame.”
The Rams hounded Boatright all night defensively. But despite throwing every defense they could think of at him, Jeffries counted four in the first half alone, Boatright still led all scorers with 28 points and hauled down 11 rebounds.
“Ryan Boatright, you can’t say enough about that kid,” Miller said. “He’s an unbelievable player. He can score at will. We were able to contain him as much as we could and that’s how we were able to get the lead.”
East Aurora cut the lead to 65-57 with 3:40 left in the fourth on a Tom Okapal rebound put-back, but it was too little, too late. Miller alone hit 14-of-16 free throws in the fourth to help the Rams seal their first sectional title since 1964.
They’ll face Rockford Auburn, who beat Huntley Friday at the Jacobs Sectional in the supersectional Tuesday at Northern Illinois University, Miller’s future basketball home.
